Hospitals in NSW welcomed 743 new doctors this month but, unfortunately, Batemans Bay and Moruya hospitals were not among them.
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As Batemans Bay and Moruya are not accredited training hospitals, they weren’t eligible to take on any of the new doctors, who recently completed their under-graduate training.
The number of graduates is expected to rise to more than 1000 by 2014, and the Australian Medical Association says that the more hospitals that can provide post-graduate training, the better.
“Our community needs more doctors, so we need to ensure that every single medical school graduate is able to complete their post-graduate training,” AMA NSW vice-president Dr Michael Gliksman said.
However, Dr David Rivett, who works at Batemans Bay and Moruya hospitals as well as Batemans Bay Medical Centre, says that neither hospital is likely to become a training hospital.
“We don’t have enough specialists here, so it is unlikely to happen, unless the NSW Government introduces legislation allowing doctors to do a term of general practice in the country in their first year,” he said.
“As it is, we don’t get a foot in the door, and these doctors don’t get to see how good country hospital practice is.”
Like many of his peers, Dr Rivett believes that Batemans Bay and Moruya are in dire need of more doctors.
“Because there are such long waiting lists at clinics, people end up in hospitals in crisis, and this is very costly to our hospital system,” he said.
“Batemans Bay has an elderly population and they are large users of medical resources.”
However, there may be some hope on the horizon because, as Dr Rivett says, the Australian National University training facility next to Batemans Bay Hospital and its medical student-training program at Batemans Bay and Moruya hospitals has provided valuable knowledge and experience for medical students.
“We are getting a lot of positive feedback that this has been a good experience for them,” he said.
The students can undertake either a six-month or a six-week course and, while they are here, they stay at residential premises at picturesque Mossy Point.
“Many of them have said they are interested in coming back when they have finished medical school,” Dr Rivett said.
