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Timaru is a city of 27,000 and it has been amazing to discuss inhabitants, located on the medical problems with people from of New Zea- totally different health and educational land. Bordered by the Wait- systems. aki and Rivers and The lack of specialists in New Zea- the Southern Alps, Timaru land is exactly the opposite in Germany. stretches over gentle green Germans don’t bother consulting their hills signaling the southern general practitioner when they feel sick, end of the rich Canterbury but go straight to a specialist. Over here plains. you have to wait up to two years for an appointment with a specialist. Patients in NZ are much more grateful for eve- Medical Care And rything you achieve for them and don‘t

­Organization Roelf Robisch, MD, take it for granted. and his wife Tatjana After finishing my specialization as The New Zealand Government spends an internist in Germany, I wanted to do 7 % of its GDP on health services. The Personal Experience something different for a while. I found Government funds primary, secondary, Global Medical Staffing on the internet and tertiary services, through the 21 Gov- For the past year I have been a locum phy- and contacted them. Global made it ernment owned District Health Boards. sician at Timaru Hospital, specializing in very easy to take a job in New Zealand. Timaru Hospital is a 24-hour general gastroenterology. My work has included They discussed the available openings, hospital with 133 beds. The hospital em- two clinics a week for patients with gas- helped me to choose the right location ploys 530 full time equivalent staff plus troenterological problems, especially diag- and then walked me through the proc- contract staff. Each year Timaru Hospital nosis and therapy of viral hepatitis. Once a ess of getting a medical registration and and Community Services provides the week I had a clinic to perform gastroscop- a visa. I don’t know if I would have suc- following services to the 53,000 people ies and colonoscopies. ceeded without Global’s help. of : My colleagues in Timaru were from all My wife Tatjana and I wanted to find a  11,000 hospital patient discharges over the world. There were anesthesiolo- place that would offer a wide variety of  16,000 Emergency Department at- gists from Russia and Denmark, surgeons recreation. Timaru is right on the ocean tendances from the Netherlands and South Africa and and you can go almost everywhere on  34,000 outpatient attendances physicians and pediatricians from England. the South Island for the weekend. We‘ve  52,000 visits to peoples homes, work- The nursing staff was also from all over. been skiing, hiking, mountain biking, places or schools. This gives Timaru a unique atmosphere fishing, jetboating. While in New Zealand, we have also Regional Statistics: had a son. We didn’t plan a pregnancy Male Life Expectancy (2005) 77.0 years but it’s been a great experience. In the Female Life Expectancy (2005) 81.3 years beginning we were quite worried about Infant Mortality (2005) 5/per 1,000 live births support and medical standards, but now Per Capita Income US-$19,800 we wouldn‘t want it any other way. The quality of life in Timaru is excel- www.moh.govt.nz/moh.nsf lent. It is a lot less hectic than life in Ger- New Zealand Ministry of Health, New Zealand`s Health many. This whole year has been a holiday and Disability System, Publications and Resources, District Health Board etc. for me, even though I have been working. www.auckland.ac.nz/ Everybody is more relaxed and friendlier University of Auckland, Information about the University, than anywhere else in the world. There’s Teaching and Learning, Research, International, Academic Programmes etc always time for small talk wherever you go www.southisland.org.nz and nobody ever seems to be in a hurry. The official tourism website for the Central South Island of Working in New Zealand has abso- New Zealand. www.gmedical.com lutely changed our lives. It’s a great gift Global Medical Staffing pioneered international medical to have the possibility to practice medi- staffing and during the past decade have placed thou- cine at the other end of the world in a sands of medical doctors and nurses into sabbaticals and totally different health system. These permanent posts throughout New Zealand, Australia, the Caribbean and the UK. are relaxed and friendly people who www.goinginternational.org don’t need much to be happy. The course catalogue “medicine & health” offers a com- prehensive overview of training and education opportuni- ties. 2,500 master‘s programs, workshops and conferences, Contact: organized by more than 700 universities and organizations Roelf Robisch, MD world wide. [email protected]

Hospital Post Europe 05/2006, p 3, GIT VERLAG GmbH & Co. KG, Darmstadt, Germany www.gitverlag.com www.pro-4-pro.com