Murray Bridge needs better hospital facilities, AMA president says
The state president of the Australian Medical Association has paid a visit to Murray Bridge to help advocate for better local facilities.
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The South Australian president of the Australian Medical Association has paid a visit to some of Murray Bridge's doctors at Bridge Clinic.
As the first president based in a regional area, John Williams has made it his personal mission to support regional doctors and patients.
"It's really important that we're heard because sometimes our voice isn't as loud as metro and we can get forgotten about," he said.
One of the biggest issues Dr Williams took note of from the doctors at Bridge Clinic was the need to improve the Murray Bridge hospital's labor ward.
Local GPs have so far spent more than a year lobbying for new maternity and dialysis wards, in line with Murray Bridge's growing population.
Health outcomes for regional patients were better when you brought services such as those to them, rather than making people travel to the service, Dr Williams said.
"Solving regional health care issues than benefits the whole health care system," he said.
"Patients need to get the same treatment as the city do."
Another big issue was the lack of after-hours radiology.
"It's difficult for the doctors when they can't provide those services, meaning sometimes they have to transfer patients to Adelaide just for a CT scan," he said.
It was great to hear what was and wasn't working, he said, so the AMA could support its members.
New funding model is needed for rural health, report finds
A new rural health issues report recently produced by the AMA found that rural hospitals were the number one issue of importance for 90 per cent of respondents.
Rural hospitals, a top priority since 2016, needed to be provided with adequate equipment, appropriate funding, staffing and resources.
Dr Williams noted that towns without general practitioners were a state-wide problem, and that Medicare wasn't meeting the needs of those practices.
"Rural practices need to be funded differently to metropolitan areas," he said.
"For rural patients, it's not a 30-minute drive down the road to see a specialist, sometimes it's a couple hours there or a flight and overnight stay.
"It can be very disruptive."
He also pointed out that working conditions were now changing for doctors: "Hours are changing and doctors are no longer working 7am to 9pm ... we need to accommodate for this."
National president Danielle McMullen said the AMA research showed consecutive federal governments had failed to prioritise healthcare issues in rural areas.
“It is high time our governments stop placing rural and remote Australia in the too-hard basket,” she said.
One encouraging fact was that rural doctors had expressed great satisfaction in their work, she said.
"Being able to treat generations of families and have strong ties to communities is an amazing feeling," she said.
