Medical Practitioner Workforce Shortages In Rural Australia

Background and Discussion

Discuss about the Medical Practitioner Workforce Shortages in Rural Australia.

There is a shortage of medical practitioners in the rural areas of Australia since many of them prefer to remain in the urban areas. According to Australian institute of health and welfare report, rural doctors represent just sixteen percent of Australia’s forty-nine thousand strong medical workforces (Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Group Training Australia, & National Skills Shortages Strategy, 2010).

Many medical professionals prefer to work in cities instead of the rural areas, therefore, leaving very few to work in the rural areas. In fact, most of the medical professionals who work in the rural areas currently in Australia are over the age of fifty years. ​The reason that is causing this problem to be elevated now is primarily because of the increasing burden of disease in the Australian population. Maningrida, Gunbalanya and Gapuwiyak are some of the major towns that are experiencing a shortage of medical practitioners (Short, & McDonald, 2012). Every year, the figure of medical consumers has been swelling while the number of the medical professionals in the rural areas has not been increasing at the same pace (Eddington, Toner, & Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2012).

The shortage of medical professionals in the rural areas has had a very negative effect. First, the people living in the rural areas are not able to access health care services on time as they should since the numbers of medical professionals are not enough to handle the big number of patient who report to the health care institutions every single day. Secondly, more people are dying in remote areas due as a result of having to wait for a long period before they can access health services. The council of Australian government’s reform council that focuses on health care reveals that the health of Australians is improving in many areas although there is still a huge gap based on where an individual lives (Mcgrail, Humphreys, Joyce, Scott, & Kalb, 2011).

The shortage of workforce in the medical field is also affecting the nurses. Nurses are usually the people who deal with clients as such, due to inadequate staffing in the rural areas; the health care workers fail to administer proper care to patients as much as they would wish. According to the consumer protection act, the patients have the right to demand the best quality of service. As such, the increase of workload for nurses sometimes results in mental stress for the staff and if not checked it can progress to become mental dysfunction (McNeil, Mitchell, & Parker, 2015).

When there are shortages of medical staff, ordinary people suffer therefore making it very difficult to achieve the local administration to meet certain targets like access to health care for all. The national government is forced to rely on international medical graduates to fulfill the medical needs of the communities in the rural areas. Shortage of the medical workforce also makes it difficult to meet the targets set by international bodies, for example, the world health organization (Scott, Larson, Jefferies, & Veenendaal, 2014).

Recommendations

Those who argue in support of the existence of medical practitioner workforce shortages in rural areas cite several studies that have been done to support this claim. One of the many researches that are used to argue in support of the issue is the health care report done by the council of Australian government’s reform council that points out that the rate of potentially preventable hospital admissions due to chronic illnesses in rural areas was almost 2.5 times that of big cities. The research also points out that one in three people living outside the cities of Australia reported longer than acceptable waiting times to see a general practitioner (Short, & McDonald, 2012).

Those who argue against the medical practitioner workforce shortages in rural areas of Australia point out that there is no shortage of medical practitioners but rather the big problems that exist are the issues of geographical mal-distribution.  They prefer to concentrate on certain regions of the country while neglecting others (Negin, Joel, Rozea, Aneuryn, Cloyd, Ben, & Martiniuk, 2013).

The government has taken several measures to try and arrest this problem. One of the strategies implemented by the government of Australia is the introduction of policies that are favorable and aimed at encouraging international medical graduates to come to Australia to live and work. Although the international medical graduates make up a significant of Australia’s medical workforce especially in rural and remote areas of the country, they have not been able to meet the demands needed to ensure that there is no shortage (Hudson, Weston & Elizabeth, 2011).

The world health organization advocates for individual countries to try as much as possible to meet their health human resource needs and this directive limits the use of international medical graduates. Research estimates that international medical graduates currently comprise of roughly thirty-nine percent of the medical workforce in Australia and forty-six percent of general practitioners in the rural area. Australia is an economically developed country it should not rely on international medical graduates to meet its medical practitioner workforce shortages in rural areas (Kamien & Buttfield, 2012).

If the medical practitioner workforce shortage in the rural areas is ignored, then most people world die as a result of diseases that could have easily been prevented since the longer it takes to access the doctor the higher the chances of an illness progressing which may lead to death. Furthermore, the nurses would also suffer from stress as a result of the increase in workload.  Finally, the standard of health care would significantly decrease since a shortage of medical practitioner workforce translates to more patients being served by one medical professional (Rogers, 2013).

To attract junior doctors to the local rural hospital, I would recommend to the management to consider giving them incentives. The incentive can be in terms of payments given to the medical practitioner in the rural community. The range of money can be dictated by the length of time spent in the rural practice as well as the remoteness of the hospital location. The company should also consider giving grants as a form of incentive to encourage junior doctors to move to the local hospital. The grant is very crucial since it will assist in the relocation process without having to incur many financial losses (Hurley, Catherine, Baum, Fran, Johns, & Labonte, 2012).

Impact on Patients

I would recommend that the doctors be given flexible working hours. Resting is crucial for medical professionals since when they are overworked, stress becomes a factor and hence the level of health care delivery to patients goes down. Flexible working hours also ensures that medical professionals have time for professional development (Harris & Short, 2014). Doctors are known to work all day dealing with emergencies, if they can find an institution where they are working flexible hours chances are that they will join the institution even if it is in the rural areas (Scott, Larson, Jefferies, & Veenendaal, 2014).

The rural company should also consider employing international medical graduates who are ready to work and live in Australia. The government has laid out policies that are very favorable to international graduates who work in the rural areas for example the ten years restricted access to a Medicare provider number that specifically applies to international medical graduates in Australia is reduced by up to five years for those international medical graduates who choose to work the rural areas of Australia (Hume & Johnston, 2016).

I would also recommend to the hospital management to consider doing workshops and visiting different medical schools to try and market benefits that come with working in the rural areas. This will ensure that students make decisions as early as possible to join institutions in the rural areas that sensitive to the needs of the medical students (Onnis & Pryce, 2016).

As far as financial implications are concerned, the company will not incur any financial costs since there are the government is working closely with health institutions and boosting their efforts by offering to assist in payment of various incentives like the providing grants and assisting in paying off loans incurred by the medical professionals while they were in medical school (Eley, Young, Louise, Shrapnel, Marilyn, Wilkinson, David, Baker, Peter, & Hegney, 2011).

As far as political implications are concerned, when these strategies are implemented effectively then the high shortage rate will start to reduce. Since most of the strategies rely mostly on government support, if they show signs of success then politicians will advocate for more funds to be pumped into these programs so that the success rate can increase (Scott, Larson, Jefferies, & Veenendaal, 2014).

If the recommendations are implemented the patients particularly those in the rural areas will benefit the most since they will have access to better health care within short  periods of time unlike before they had to wait for hours before seeing a doctor (Kamien & Buttfield, 2012).

The solutions will be implemented by engaging with government official so that they can assist in funding the doctor. The implementation will be done by the management of the hospital in consultation with heads of relevant government department (Onnis & Pryce, 2016).  

Communication

The information need to reach international medical graduates who live in Australia and government departments especially the health department. The recommendation will be communicated through face to face meeting as a through email (Rogers, 2013).

References

Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry., Group Training Australia., & National Skills Shortages Strategy (Australia). (2010). Group training: New ways to meet skill and labour shortages. Canberra: Dept. of Education, Science and Training.

Eddington, N., Toner, P., & Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. (2012). Skills Formation Strategies in Queensland: A Skills Shortage?. Paris: OECD Publishing.

Eley, Diann, Young, Louise, Shrapnel, Marilyn, Wilkinson, David, Baker, Peter, & Hegney, Desley. (2011). Medical students and rural general practitioners: congruent views on reality of recruitment into rural medicine. 12-20.) Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Asia.

Harris, R., & Short, T. (2014). Workforce development: Perspectives and issues.

Hudson, Judith N, Weston, Kathryn M, & Farmer, Elizabeth A. (2011). Engaging rural preceptors in new longitudinal community clerkships during workforce shortage: a qualitative study. (BioMed Central Ltd.) BioMed Central Ltd.

Hume, C., Hume, M., & Johnston, P. (October 01, 2016). Creating Awareness and Practice: The [email protected] Framework for Knowledge Management in Aged Care Services. International Journal of Reliable and Quality E-Healthcare (ijrqeh), 5, 4, 1-14.

Hurley, Catherine, Baum, Fran, Johns, Julie, & Labonte, Ron. (2012). Comprehensive Primary Health Care in Australia: findings from a narrative review of the literature. (Comprehensive Primary Health Care in Australia: findings from a narrative review of the literature.)Bottom of Form

Kamien, M., & Buttfield, I. H. (January 01, 2012). Some solutions to the shortage of general practitioners in rural Australia. Part 1. Medical school selection. The Medical Journal of Australia, 153, 2, 105-7.

Mcgrail, Humphreys, Joyce, Scott, & Kalb, (May 01, 2011). Rural Amenity and Medical Workforce Shortage: Is there a Relationship?. Geographical Research, 49, 2, 192-202.

McNeil, K., Mitchell, R., & Parker, V. (March 01, 2015). The paradoxical effects of workforce shortages on rural interprofessional practice. Scandinavian Journal of Caring Sciences, 29, 1, 73-82.

Negin, Joel, Rozea, Aneuryn, Cloyd, Ben, & Martiniuk, Alexandra LC. (2013). Foreign-born health workers in Australia: an analysis of census data. (BioMed Central Ltd.) BioMed Central Ltd.

Onnis, L. L., & Pryce, J. (January 01, 2016). Health professionals working in remote Australia: a review of the literature. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 54, 1, 32-56.

Rogers, N. J. (January 01, 2013). Shortage of general practitioners in Australia. The Medical Journal of Australia, 2, 16.)

Scott, J., Larson, A., Jefferies, F., & Veenendaal, B. (October 01, 2014). Small-area estimates of general practice workforce shortage in rural and remote Western Australia.Australian Journal of Rural Health, 14, 5, 209-213.

Short, S. D., & McDonald, F. (2012). Health workforce governance: Improved access, good regulatory practice, safer patients. Farnham Surrey, England: Ashgate Pub.