MP says regions need more GPs

REGIONAL and rural healthcare is being put under pressure due to a lack of general practitioners says Federal Member for Bendigo, Lisa Chesters.

The local MP met with Healthworks Healthcare administrators in Kangaroo Flat last week to discuss what can be done about the staffing shortfall.

“We need more GPs. We need more GPs in our country, and we need more in Bendigo,” she said. “Our GPs are under pressure.

“We need more funding in Medicare to help our primary care delivery.”

Ms Chesters said an increase in the number of GPs would help reduce the stress placed on the healthcare sector, but the right supports needed to be put in place to achieve that.

“We also need to be training more GPs in our regions,” she said.

“If we are wanting to recruit overseas doctors here, we need to fix the training so that way they can come here and settle in and get on with general practice.”

According to Ms Chester, clinics have been overrun with patients since the beginning of the pandemic.

She also said extra funding is necessary for regional and remote areas to meet the needs of patients.

“There’s been no extra funding to our primary healthcare services to help meet that demand,” she said.

“They [the Federal Government] need to increase the rebate for bulk billing practices so the GPs are earning more so they can help meet the costs of delivering their services.

“You can’t ask GPs to be running at a loss and doing it out of good will.”

Retaining doctors in the region has also been a challenge for health practices, with senior practice and finance manager at Healthworks, Abdul Ali, saying the issue is the biggest challenge the company is facing.

Finding GPs to supervise new doctors has also become a challenge in recent years.

The change in criteria for becoming a fellow of the College of General Practitioners has made it harder to find GPs who can supervise new doctors.

“Three or four years back, anyone who had full registration could supervise overseas doctors,” Mr Ali said. “Most of our doctors are overseas trained doctors.

“In the last three or four years the supervisor needs to be a fellow and one for the last three years.”