Gunnedah doctor Chris Gittoes has outlined the priorities of the Rural Doctors’ Association of NSW after being elected as the lobby group’s new president.
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The local GP, who has just opened his own local practice with Dr Ken Adams, was nominated for the role in December and is looking forward to ensuring rural practitioners have a voice.
“The Rural Doctors Association tries to ensure funding for medical training and resource allocation for rural medicine is done effectively,” Dr Gittoes said.
“Within that, there are some specific issues. That’s the role of the organisation – to represent constituents when specific issues arise, be that local, state or federal.”
The most recent issue the association has been involved with surrounds the Medicare rebate where the federal government eventually bowed to pressure to scrap plans to cut the rebate for short GP visits and promised to consult on health reform.
“We’ve just had this huge debacle with changes to Medicare and we’ll hopefully be involved in the consultation process [Health] Minister Ley has promised to be a part of,” Dr Gittoes said.
“We hope to be involved in future policy.”
Dr Gittoes said the issues the lobby group was involved in were mostly state-related and could be anything from issues
arising from doctors working in hospitals to a dispute about the way a local health service was treating a GP.
“We also deal with the National Rural Doctors Association and we have a significant input into national issues because of course those issues affects GPs throughout the country.”
Other issues the Rural Doctors’ Association of NSW will focus on include securing funding for doctors in training and the allocation to facilitate that process, as well as assisting with rural scholarships for young GPs.
Dr Gittoes also hopes to bring more attention to the lobby group and increase its membership base.