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Speaker 1: Now the federal government has announced the largest investment in

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Speaker 1: medicare since its creation over forty years ago, with eight

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Speaker 1: point five billion dollars to deliver an additional eighteen million

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Speaker 1: bulk build GP visits each year. The federal government also

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Speaker 1: announcing hundreds of nursing scholarships and thousands more doctors in

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Speaker 1: the largest GP training program ever. It all sounds very positive.

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Speaker 1: It always does when these election commitments being made. We

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Speaker 1: know the coalition has pledged to do the same or

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Speaker 1: very similar, but so often in these situations, the devil

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Speaker 1: really is in the detail. Now joining me on the

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Speaker 1: show is the president of the Northern Territory Branch of

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Speaker 1: the Australian Medical Association, Doctor Robert Parker. Good morning, doctor.

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Speaker 2: Parker, Good morning CODYD.

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Speaker 1: Now what will these changes mean from your perspective?

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Speaker 2: Well, hopefully it'll mean that a lot more GPS will

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Speaker 2: be able to box Bill and hopefully there'll be a

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Speaker 2: lot more GPS. Has been an alarming decrease in medical

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Speaker 2: practitioners going into general practice. And as we know for

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Speaker 2: many years that primary care is an essential component of

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Speaker 2: care and it's the cheapest full of care. People treated

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Speaker 2: through primary care. Maybe general practice. It's much cheaper than

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Speaker 2: putting people into hospital, so hopefully it'll be a significant

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Speaker 2: and we're all hoping that both sides of politics come

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Speaker 2: up with the goods. It'll be a significant boost to

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Speaker 2: medical care because the problem has been is I think

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Speaker 2: we're all aware that because of the gap, a number

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Speaker 2: of people can no longer afford to go to the GP,

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Speaker 2: and it means that they don't get their chronic illness

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Speaker 2: as treated. They end up in hospital. I'm often very

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Speaker 2: distressing for the person, very very difficult for the hospitals,

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Speaker 2: and more pressure in the hospital.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you spot on. I think that so often people

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Speaker 1: find it so expensive to go to the GP, but

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Speaker 1: sometimes as well you just can't get in.

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Speaker 2: Well. And that's the issue about the number of gps.

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Speaker 2: Obviously there's been a significant reduction in people going into

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Speaker 2: or practice for a range of reasons, and I think

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Speaker 2: those of the government's hoping that encouraging more doctors devisional

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Speaker 2: practice will make it a bit easier to get an

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Speaker 2: apployment in the future.

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Speaker 1: And doctor Parker, I mean, as you've touched on there

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Speaker 1: as well, it does then indeed mean that there is

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Speaker 1: a strain on the hospital if people can't get in

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Speaker 1: to see their GP, sometimes they might just go all right,

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Speaker 1: I'm going to rock up to emergency or worse still,

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Speaker 1: they let their health issue faster and it gets worse

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Speaker 1: and worse, and then they end up having to spend

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Speaker 1: serious time in the hospital. So, I mean, I think I,

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Speaker 1: like so many other Aussies, am hoping that this is

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Speaker 1: going to be a good thing.

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Speaker 2: Well we're hoping, so, I mean, the IMA has pointed

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Speaker 2: out though that it doesn't the money doesn't or the

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Speaker 2: concept of more appointments or shorter pointment doesn't really suit

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Speaker 2: modern medicine. I mean, many many care medi bank medi

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Speaker 2: bank I think was the original concept was actually concept

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Speaker 2: designed on moss casts kitchen table in Melbourne in the

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Speaker 2: nineteen sixties with god Whittle and Moss Casts and two

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Speaker 2: economists of Scotland Eople and the current medicare concept it's

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Speaker 2: pretty much what they developed in the nineteen sixties. Now

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Speaker 2: things have moved on. It's been seventy years since the

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Speaker 2: nineteen sixties, pretty much for fifty years, and things are

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Speaker 2: just not the same and there's a lot people are a

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Speaker 2: lot older now, they've got a lot more chronic illness,

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Speaker 2: and the funding that's announced by both sides of politics

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Speaker 2: doesn't really suit current models general practice, and the AMA

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Speaker 2: has been arguing there needs to be a lot more

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Speaker 2: accommodation rather than having a number of short appointments. There

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Speaker 2: needs to be much more accommodation for the proper care

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Speaker 2: of people suffering a range of chronic illnesses.

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Speaker 1: Now tell me the government's also set to deliver. They say,

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Speaker 1: more doctors and nurses into medicare, with four hundred nursing

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Speaker 1: scholarships and the largest GP training program in Australian history.

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Speaker 1: That's what they've announced, funding the training of two thousand

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Speaker 1: new GP trainees a year by twenty twenty eight. Again

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Speaker 1: good news, but what's it going to mean? Do you

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Speaker 1: think for people living in regional parts of Australia like Darwin,

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Speaker 1: but even more remote.

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Speaker 2: As well, well, you always hope that the semis will

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Speaker 2: be I mean the key is often GP registrars and

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Speaker 2: encouraging people to be GP registrars, having proper pay entitlements

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Speaker 2: for them. One of the big problems for CP registers

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Speaker 2: is they can't carry in titlement, so they finish one

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Speaker 2: practice and can't carry the lead to another practice, and

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Speaker 2: there's been some funding models like in Tasmania. Now GPS

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Speaker 2: are actually Keepe registers are employed by the government so

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Speaker 2: they can transfer their entitlement across. So the plan is

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Speaker 2: keep registrars. Hopefully you can get them into the bush locations,

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Speaker 2: they can enjoy it there and come back to practice

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Speaker 2: when they get their fellowship. So hopefully this is going

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Speaker 2: to work to develop more get more GPS into the

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Speaker 2: regional areas where they're needed.

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Speaker 1: Dr Parker, are there any concerns that you can see

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Speaker 1: from this announcement that's been made and you know, particularly

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Speaker 1: for us here in the Northern territory.

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Speaker 2: Well, again, it would be really good if we get

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Speaker 2: more GPS in the territory. The main concern again is

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Speaker 2: with our population. We all know a third of our

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Speaker 2: population digenes, a lot of them. I've got chronic, significant

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Speaker 2: chronic issues. As per closed the gap. But again that

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Speaker 2: model that was developed on Moscaster's kitchen table in the

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Speaker 2: sixties does not really suit modern medicine and the burden

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Speaker 2: of disease affecting a significant portion of the Australian population.

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Speaker 2: So we're hoping the AMA is hoping that it can

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Speaker 2: be adapted so people with chronic illness can be probably

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Speaker 2: better cared for than rather the whole series of short appointments.

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Speaker 1: Now, has there been any updates since you and I

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Speaker 1: last spoke in relation to the situation at the maternity

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Speaker 1: ward at the Darwin Private Hospital. Obviously some serious concerns

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Speaker 1: last week. Has there been much movement from.

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Speaker 2: What you can gather, Well, the government has developed this

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Speaker 2: thing of having plush hotels for people with care, but

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Speaker 2: the problem is that something goes wrong in one of

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Speaker 2: those hotel rooms, and things can go wrong very quickly.

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Speaker 2: In ebs cetric, fortunately is a very small number of

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Speaker 2: things that can go wrong, but when they go wrong

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Speaker 2: very quickly, they can be really significant. And being able

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Speaker 2: to get an ambulance to get someone into from a

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Speaker 2: plush hotel room to our hospital with a you know,

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Speaker 2: available ambulances can be problematic. So that's going to be

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Speaker 2: an issue. I suspect the whole with the whole thing,

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Speaker 2: I mean, good on you know, it's good that people

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Speaker 2: can appreciate those plush hotel rooms, but if you know,

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Speaker 2: the whole issue of having I think in the hospital

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Speaker 2: is if something goes wrong, it's very close to immediate

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Speaker 2: care with theaters and other professionals that can help. And

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Speaker 2: I mean there was I don't know if you saw

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Speaker 2: there was a program in television This is not going

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Speaker 2: to hurt a bit about an ebstetric registrar in the

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Speaker 2: UK about all the things that were wrong with the nags.

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Speaker 2: But at one stage he gets going to a plush

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Speaker 2: ebs cetric hospital away from the public hospital for a night,

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Speaker 2: you know, and all it gets, all the bells and whistles, food, alcohol,

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Speaker 2: beautiful rooms, and something goes wrong very quickly, very badly,

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Speaker 2: and he has to try and sort the whole mess

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Speaker 2: out and there was no resources in the hospital to

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Speaker 2: do that. Yeah, so you know that's one of the

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Speaker 2: things why you have a hospital rather than a hotel

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Speaker 2: room for mother's postpartum. But anyway, it's a government program.

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Speaker 1: Well yeah, this is it. It's obviously a government program.

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Speaker 1: I know people are sort of questioning though where the

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Speaker 1: funding or how that's going to be paid for. But

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Speaker 1: also you know, people sort of questioning if and how

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Speaker 1: much additional strain it's going to put on Royal Darwin

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Speaker 1: Hospital and our other hospitals now without that maternity ward,

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Speaker 1: that's right, Well, it's.

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Speaker 2: Going to be an increasing number of women birthing in

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Speaker 2: the birthing suites. We're going to require more stuff. There's more,

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Speaker 2: you know, And you and I talked for years about

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Speaker 2: the constant pressure on the empty hospital has been the

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Speaker 2: biggest being the busiest hospitals in Australia. Or this is

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Speaker 2: just a further pressure that they probably don't need at

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Speaker 2: the moment. Before this, I mean, hopefully big flush of

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Speaker 2: money coming to hospitals in this budget and the next

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Speaker 2: budget that Albani has promised will assist that. But as

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Speaker 2: you know, the Territory hospitals are the busiest in Australia

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Speaker 2: and it's just a further added pressure to the hospital they.

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Speaker 1: At the moment, Dr Parker, before I let you go,

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Speaker 1: there has indeed been reports that police are investigating a

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Speaker 1: link between the suspected suicide of a senior staff member

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Speaker 1: employed at Royal Darwin Hospital and a male colleague who

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Speaker 1: was last week charged with accessing child exploitation material. According

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Speaker 1: to the Northern Territory News, police have charged a forty

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Speaker 1: five year old man with two counts of possessing child

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Speaker 1: abuse material. It follows the discovery of a body of

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Speaker 1: that staff member who's believed to have taken his own

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Speaker 1: life in the workplace. How are staff going in the

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Speaker 1: hospital at the moment? I know that obviously there would

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Speaker 1: not be much that you can say, but you know,

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Speaker 1: what's sort of your understanding, and how are staff going

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Speaker 1: at the moment?

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Speaker 2: Well, unfortunately, I mean the shop death of that doctor

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Speaker 2: was very it was very upsetting, and I mean we

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Speaker 2: understand that there was an event held on Tuesday morning

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Speaker 2: where set about the whole thing came. Obviously, this additional

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Speaker 2: factor is developed what they call complicated grief, where people

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Speaker 2: obviously have very strong feelings about the doctor who's left us,

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Speaker 2: but also now I've got mixed feelings about potentially other issues.

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Speaker 2: So it's probably complicating grief and potentially mental health issues

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Speaker 2: for the affected staff, which is which I know the

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Speaker 2: government has put in additional resources. But there's obviously a

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Speaker 2: significant complicating factor for a very difficult situation for hospital staff.

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Speaker 1: I mean, and I guess people listening this morning are

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Speaker 1: also going to be thinking, is there you know, is

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Speaker 1: there a guarantee that you know that people are going

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Speaker 1: to be safe when they come to the hospital. Obviously

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Speaker 1: you know this this person who's been charged, it's a

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Speaker 1: very significant and serious charge with two counts of possessing

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Speaker 1: child abuse material.

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Speaker 2: Look, you can never absolutely guarantee issues, but hospitals are

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Speaker 2: very public places, and I mean I've done anesthetics as

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Speaker 2: a term. You know, there's nurses and other people, and

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Speaker 2: it's very unusual for ommethens Is to be left alone

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Speaker 2: with a patient in any time in the public hospital.

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Speaker 2: So I think it's highly unlikely that any irregularity has occurred.

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Speaker 2: And I think, you know, we've given me the public

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Speaker 2: spaces and all the stuff around. I think we can

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Speaker 2: be rest assured that safety, you know, is paramount in

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Speaker 2: most of these cases. I can't give an absolute guarantee

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Speaker 2: about that.

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Speaker 1: That well, Doctor Robert Parker, we better leave it there.

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Speaker 1: We are going to be catching up with the federal

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Speaker 1: Health Minister in just a moment's time. Really appreciate your time.

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Speaker 2: Ask him about Moss Cares and the models of care

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Speaker 2: and why I thinks haven't changed since GoF Whitler met

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Speaker 2: Moss Cares in the sixties with Scottland and Evil. It

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Speaker 2: might be interesting to hearing his response because it's exactly

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Speaker 2: the same model of care that was developed then. It

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Speaker 2: hasn't changed in fifty years and it might be listening

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Speaker 2: to you. What Mark Buttle's going to say about it?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, whether we need an update, Doctor Parker, good to

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Speaker 1: talk to you. Thank you so much for your time

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Speaker 1: this morning. Thank you, Okay, thanks