From the President... Last Federal Budget
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IMSANZ INTERNAL MEDICINE SOCIETY OF AUSTRALIA & NEW ZEALAND AUGUST 2007 From the President... last federal budget. How these benefits flow-on into salaries and workforce recruitment will be Kia ora, bula vinaka, talofa, maloleilei, hello. President of utmost importance. The medical workforce is Phillippa Poole, NZ The General Matters now a regular COAG agenda item, with even the Prime Minister taking an interest. Over Has the drought finally broken? Having just the years, Di Howard and Emma Spencer Vice President spent several days in Gippsland, Victoria, beset have made IMSANZ aware of the dire health Alasdair MacDonald, TAS by a weather system that delivered 12 inches inequities existing in the Northern Territory; the of rain in one day, there seemed some hope of issues are now, at least, being discussed, even Hon Secretary this. In this final editorial before handing over the if the Federal Government approach seems Nick Buckmaster, QLD IMSANZ Presidency to Alasdair MacDonald at heavy-handed to some. the AGM in September, it’s heartening to report Hon Treasurer that there is evidence that the ‘general medicine On the other side of the Tasman, the Ministers’ Mary-Ann Ryall, ACT drought’ may also be breaking. Workforce Taskforce Report entitled ‘Reshaping Medical Education and Training to Meet the General medicine is very much on state Past President Challenges of the 21st Century’ was released and national radar screens. In Australia, in May. The full report is available from the Ian Scott, QLD the Commonwealth CMO, Dr John Horvath, Ministry of Health website1. Although yet to be admitted at the recent MedEd 2007 conference ratified by Cabinet, recommendations include Councillors that he and others had got it wrong in fostering increasing medical student numbers towards Aidan Foy, NSW super-specialisation (see page 13 for the news national self sufficiency, and the setting up of Gabriel Shannon, NSW item). This is a major change of direction from a Medical Training Board to oversee the entire Dawn DeWitt, VIC someone who played a major part in dismantling continuum of medical training. This Board would Richard King, VIC most of the general medical services in Sydney be charged with working with educational and Andrew Bowers, NZ over the past two decades. There are now some training organisations to ensure that: Briar Peat, NZ glimmers of hope for the re-establishment of Nicole Hancock, TAS more General Medical units in Sydney - we are • all medical practitioners acquire a broad Emma Spencer, NT aware of at least two areas considering setting general foundation, which includes David Taverner, SA up acute undifferentiated medical services; more community and regional hospital experience, Tony Ryan, WA on this as discussions firm up. In the meantime, before entering vocational training please continue to direct your Sydney-based • the training system produces sufficient Advanced Trainee Reps colleagues to the IMSANZ position paper on numbers of doctors entering the New Josephine Thomas, SA MAPUs. Zealand workforce with training in general Ingrid Naden, NZ vocational scopes of practice. Against predictions, Les Bolitho and Jack Best from the AACP succeeded in getting the new My recent visit to Gippsland was to lead a team Co-Opted Councillors complex disease MBS items approved in the James Williamson, WA Continued next page... Denise Aitken, NZ Secretariat In this issue... 145 Macquarie Street Principles of General Medicine Training ............................................................ 3 Sydney NSW 2000 AUSTRALIA How Others See Us ... ........................................................................................ 8 Feminisation of Workforce and Generation X .................................................... 9 Telephone Hospitalists - A New Breed .............................................................................. 11 + 61 2 9256 9630 Chronic and Complex Conditions .................................................................... 13 Facsimile Councillor Profile ............................................................................................. 14 + 61 2 9247 7214 Letter from the Pacific ...................................................................................... 17 Email General Internal Medicine Meeting Report ...................................................... 18 [email protected] What’s New on the Website ............................................................................ 20 What’s in the Journals ..................................................................................... 21 Website www.imsanz.org.au New Zealand Perspectives on the Hospitalist Debate ..................................... 23 First International Conference - The Society for Acute Medicine .................... 24 © 2007 IMSANZ Forthcoming Meetings ..................................................................................... 26 PRESIDENT’S REPORT to evaluate Monash University’s proposal centres into contextualised RACP regional training networks for a graduate Gippsland Medical School. should result in more physicians prepared for medical practice Local students of rural or indigenous outside metropolitan centres. origin would have priority, undertaking In late June, the RACP AMDC adopted a policy paper on the bulk of their medical programme Principles for Undifferentiated Medical Training. (see pages 3-7). in a regional / rural setting. Monash Championed by Dr John Kolbe, Chair of the Adult Division, and students already have the opportunity for three IMSANZ Councillors, this document sets out principles and placements at Latrobe Regional Hospital action points for the RACP and IMSANZ in respect of training (one of five major regional hospitals in for provision of acute general medical services. We owe John Victoria) and other smaller hospitals in a huge vote of thanks for pushing on with this. The document the Gippsland region. The students we will be of immediate relevance in deliberations with the health met from the current programme enthusiastically praised their sector and in shaping the direction of the RACP Education clinical teachers, and their range of learning experiences; they Strategy. It was also a necessary step to have this approved believed they were performing better than their city counterparts prior to starting negotiations on the MOU between the RACP and nearly all were planning to work in a regional setting in the and IMSANZ. Again, please use the Principles document to longer term. The local hospital management seemed well aware inform any local developments, and RACP committee work in of the need to employ generalists with other speciality interests, which you are involved. and not sub-specialists who ‘have’ to do general medicine. Hopefully these developments encourage your efforts for general To date there has been only a small increase in the number of medicine. We must ensure this general medicine drought is general medical trainees in Australia to 48, up from 38 last year. ended, for our patients’ sakes. I’m confident new President Numbers in NZ are stable around the 120 mark, many of whom Alasdair MacDonald, IMSANZ Council and membership will are dual training in another specialty. keep the RACP, the respective governments and the area health Many of the advertisements in the recent RACP training services focused on creating a physician workforce with the right supplement feature general medicine registrar positions; job skill set, in the right location, for arguably, the right price. ads for general physicians are becoming more prominent on the In closing, it’s noteworthy that IMSANZ is now 10 years old. For IMSANZ website and in the RACP news. The jobs are there….. the information of our newer members, IMSANZ was formed from we just need to fill them. the two respective national societies at the RACP meeting held By 2012, Australia will graduate in excess of 3,000 doctors; in Auckland in May 1997. There is now a record membership of this represents an 81% increase in the number of graduating 454, with 14 Pacific members and two more life members, Neil doctors from 20052. There will be more than 1,000 extra Graham and Michael Kennedy (see page 19). For those of you students in Victoria in 2012 than there are now. While GPs coming to Adelaide in September, it’ll be a chance to celebrate and hospital specialists are understandably very anxious about and revisit IMSANZ’s history. The programme being developed the supervision demands created by this ‘tsunami’ of students, by Justin La Brooy, Jo Thomas and Mark Morton looks great. I medical schools are aware of this and are trying hard to minimise hope to catch up with many of you there. impacts by employing more staff (including nurse teachers), a wider range of clinical activities, clinical skills laboratories, and PHILLIPPA POOLE flexible / on-line course delivery methods. Channelling some of President the students currently having excellent experiences in smaller 1 http://www.moh.govt.nz/moh.nsf/pagesmh/6100/$File/reshaping-medical-education-workforce-taskforce.doc 2 http://www.amsa.org.au/CLINTRAINING190607.pdf, accessed 6 July 2007 IMSANZ COUNCIL NEEDS YOU! If you are passionate about retaining general medical services and you like what you are reading in the newsletter, PLEASE consider a position on IMSANZ Council. There are several upcoming retirements. States in which we urgently need councillors are NSW, SA and WA. Please contact, without obligation: Phillippa Poole (President) - [email protected]