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Points of Interest About Forrest House
from Dr Peter Wallace
Workforce Issues
The predictions for GP numbers in WA are:
A steady fall for 5 to 8 years
A rise after 2012
Australia not been training enough Doctors and so :
The GP stream is at about 50% of what is required
60% GP's in training are overseas graduates
Many are part time
Over 50% of Senior GP's will retire by 2009 in WA
The working week has generally been shortened:
Baby boomers are becoming more sensible with safer hours
Younger doctors are not falling into the overworking trap
An average WA GPs working week has shortened by 8 hours over the past year
Many problems ensue. A lot of thinking has gone into protecting health services in Pinjarra.
Pinjarra's Dream Solution
To keep GP services in Pinjarra we need GP's who live in Peel.
To keep the hospital busy we need doctors who use the hospital.
To attract and keep GP's in the area we need to provide the best possible facilities.
To attract and keep allied health personnel in the area we need excellent facilities and professional interaction.
To bring specialist services to town we need good premises.
The pipe dream is to build a large medical centre on the hospital grounds.
This has wholesale support from:
All the local doctors
The shire
Major community organisations
The health service
It has a high chance of becoming a reality and would be the biggest boost to local services for years.
Telephones
In order to cope with the workload we utilise telephones to the greatest possible extent.
The front desk takes some 500 calls on a Monday morning.
The sisters answer 150 calls in the same time period.
The practice' phone bill is huge.
We have opted not to return calls to mobile numbers routinely as an economy measure.
Specialist Training
This practice has been training GP's in their specialty as they work towards their fellowship exam for 25 years.
The registrars are doctors who have been qualified and gaining experience elsewhere for about 5 years when they join the training scheme.
Entry into the scheme is restrictive as it only accepts doctors likely to be suited to General Practice.
The usual term is six months but many registrars stay longer, and some have never left!
Most of the training is done by Dr Peter Wallace and Dr Eileen Bristol.
Our wholesale support of the scheme has meant:
That we have had a wide range of talented doctors through the town
That we are a well known practice, within the profession
That we have had to keep up with or set new trends
That we have sufficient staff to keep the hospital open
We have had over 50 registrars. Recently many of them have been female and some 40% fall pregnant during their term (i'ts the country air).
Overseas Trained Doctors (IMG)
For many years Australia has relied on overseas graduates to fill the gaps simply because we do not train enough doctors.
There are over 650 IMGs in WA. It is nearer 1200 in Queensland.
Most of the GP's in the Peel region are IMGs, and some have been here for 30 years or more.
It is not easy to gain a position as an IMG General Practitioner in WA.
Unlike Queensland there are many quality controls and there is ongoing supervision by the medical board.
IMG's have to make a huge commitment in order to stay.
They are obliged to take the fellowship exam even although most of them have achieved that level or an equivalent level in their own country.
Forrest House has always enjoyed the benefits of IMG’s.
The practice just could not exist without them. This would be true for most (60%) of country practices. Indeed the major hospitals are also reliant on a steady influx of IMGs to keep their wards open.
The current furore stemming from a Queensland bureaucratic mistake has led to an outrageously unfair portrayal of IMGs in the media.
These talented guests are the very backbone of our health system.
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