Gunnedah GP trainees to help lighten heavy load

Three GP registrars from Sydney will make the shire their home for six months as they learn the ropes from local doctors at Barber Street Practice and Northwest Family Medical, thanks to an initiative of the Primary Health Network (PHN).

Barber Street practice manager Di Tumbers said registrars had become as "scarce as hen's teeth' and the practice hadn't hosted one in the past 18 months.

Ms Tumbers said while it won't mean the practice can take on any more patients, it will help with the backlog.

"We're expecting them to take the overflow each day if patients can't get into their normal GP," she said.

"It's very encouraging we've got two."

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Over at Northwest, the Sydney registrar will join another GP trainee from Queensland who is already at work after returning to town for a second round.

Dr Chris Gittoes said it would be "wonderful" to have another pair of helping hands.

"It will help us provide better care of the community of Gunnedah because it will increase the capacity to see patients," he said.

"Hopefully, they will both participate in looking after patients in the hospital and the nursing homes ... they will be exposed to a wide variety of presentations that occur in a rural general practice, which tends to be not a lot of one thing but a little bit of everything."

Dr Gittoes said there had been a dry spell for registrars in town because there was a shortage of doctors coming through the training system.

"It's sort of a multi-level problem. I don't consider there are enough doctors being trained in Australia and those being trained are continuing to elect to numerous sub-specialities rather than going to general practice," he said.

"We have done a lot of work at trying to attract doctors to town without a lot of help, and we're happy we've been able to find these two competent young doctors to come and provide health care for the community of Gunnedah."

PHN's Rebecca Brennan said the lack of registrars coming to towns such as Gunnedah, Inverell and Moree had been a "red flag", so the organisation set out to create an initiative to draw them in.

"As the Primary Health Network, we work with all primary health providers to make sure we are filling those gaps and when we identify a gap like this, we step in and see what we can to close that gap," she said.

Ms Brennan said "GP fatigue" was far too common and drawing registrars to rural and regional areas would "go some way to lightening the load and reducing waiting times for patients".

"We're hoping by introducing registrars to the region, they will fall in love with all of the charm and character these rural and regional areas can offer and introduce them to life out of the city," she said.

PHN is hopeful the registrars will see there are "other options" and choose to come back to the country and settle. Two registrars will work in Inverell and two in Moree.

The lack of doctors in Gunnedah is still a pressing concern for the community after a number of failed attempts to relaunch the rural health centre.

Local GPs met in private with a working group in December to discuss the ongoing crisis but there has been no word on the next steps.

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