In the debate about the shortage of doctors in Glen Innes, one of the GPs in the town has made a blunt statement: “Too many ethnic people arrive in Australia and they want to stay in their own cliques and they don’t even want to speak English.”
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Dr E K Wong of the East Avenue Medical Centre told the Examiner that this applied to both ethnic minority people who had trained as doctors abroad and those from ethnic minority backgrounds who were born in Australia.
Dr Wong came to Australia as a child and was educated in school and university in Sydney. His parents were from Singapore but he is completely Australian.
His statement came in a discussion among doctors and town councillors about what could be done to make it easier to recruit GPs to Glen Innes. The town council was presenting a cheque for $5,000 to the clinic as a contribution towards the cost of recruting a new doctor.
“You need a little enticement and a little whipping from the rear,” Dr Wong said, “Carrot and stick.”
Doctors from overseas are obliged to do some work outside cities, but Dr Wong’s complaint is that they do the minimum and then return to what he called “enclaves”.
This may be because they do not feel at ease in places like Glen Innes, according to another worker at the practice. Jane Cooke who manages the East Avenue Medical Centre said that it was understandable that people from different backgrounds might want to stay among people with the same background.
The problem of attracting doctors was tougher if the spouse wasn’t able to work, she felt. The husband or wife might then be reluctant to move from the city to a place with a less diverse group of people, she felt.
Being a dcotor in a city has some advantages, according to local doctors. In Glen Innes, the needs of the hospital are met by local GPs with temporary doctors flying in from Sydney at a pay-rate of $5,000 for the weekend.
In cities, doctors work shifts – they do their time and go home. In Glen Innes, emergency calls can come at any time, even when there is a waiting room full of patients in their surgery.
Jane Cooke, the Centre manager, said: “We know how hard the doctors in Glen Innes work in their Practices and also at the Glen Innes Hospital. We will need younger doctors coming through to continue a high level of patient care at the practice and also at the hospital.”
The new GP at the Centre, Dr James White, has a country background and came because he and his wife enjoy a rural life.
He’s already taken on a hundred new patients, though the Medical Centre still has a hundred on its waiting list.
Dr White believes that the shortage will ease as a wave of newly trained doctors emerges from universities.