Steve Toms said the Greens were playing politics and their proposal might work against the community.  Compelling doctors to be permanently at the hospital might make it harder to attract GPs to the town, is his view.

The Greens in Glen Innes organised a petition calling for a permanent doctor to be stationed at the district hospital on Taylor Street.  At the moment, the system is that GPs in the town are rostered to be on call and if there is an emergency they go to the hospital to deal with it.

At the last count, 650 people had signed the petition – more than ten per cent of the population.

There is a feeling among senior medical staff in Glen Innes that the petition over-simplified the problem – “who wouldn’t want more doctors?” as one medical professional put it.

Mr Toms says that the real problem is the broader system and the difficulty of attracting enough GPs to the town who also have specialist skills so they can be anesthetists, surgeons or obstetricians as well as performing their usual role as General Practitioners based in surgeries.

One of the problems is that doctors here are loathe to be rostered on call over the weekend and so other doctors, unconnected with the area, have to be flown in from Sydney to cover.  This is very expensive.

On Mayor Toms’ argument, trying to compel local doctors to take on a role at the hospital might deter more from seeking a permanent move here.  For him, the real issue is the shortage of doctors across rural Australia and that stems from a wider system.

On average, thirteen people a day go to the Emergency Department at the hospital.  Some of these cases are relatively minor and can be dealt with by a nurse.  The more serious ones are treated by a doctor who is called in.  If necessary, the patient can then be moved to a bigger hospital in Armidale or Tamworth.

One of the difficulties at the moment is that a GP who had extra obstetric skills has left so there is a gap in the skill-set among the ten GPs in Glen Innes.  One GP with obstetric skills remains but the loss of the other one means fewer GPs available for difficult births.  This means more referrals to outside hospitals, with expectant mothers having to travel.