Government ‘blunder’ may force Pearcedale’s GP clinic to shut

It serves a close-knit community in regional Victoria but a “bureaucratic blunder” may force Pearcedale’s only medical clinic to close its doors.

Pearcedale’s only GP clinic is threatening to close its doors because of what it calls a bureaucratic blunder.

The Pearcedale Medical Centre, which cares for more than 4000 patients, says it is a victim of the federal health department’s Distribution Priority Area (DPA) classification system which has rezoned it as a metropolitan, rather than a regional, clinic.

The classification is used to identify locations with a shortage of medical practitioners. It is also essential for clinics to employ international medical graduates.

Clinic owner Dr Farza Rastegar says before the system was introduced in 2019 her clinic was classified as a District of Workforce Shortage (DWS) allowing her to employ overseas medical graduates, which she says are essential to help keep the clinic open.

Now she has four doctors, down from seven, and Dr Rastegar says it has been impossible to attract other GPs to work in the area that is 50km southeast of Melbourne.

From next week she will cut the clinic hours. If she cannot get the clinic rezoned, Dr Rastegar says closing permanently may be the only option.

Pearcedale Medical Centre’s Dr Farza Rastegar with patient Winter, 9. Picture: Sarah Bacaller

She said two of the three who have left the practice this year are no longer working as GPs. Of the four remaining, she says two travel more than an hour each way to work.

“Even with seven doctors we were struggling to keep up with demand. Now with four we get booked out quickly and at times we can’t see sick people on the day,” Dr Rastegar said.

“We will close one day a week from Wednesday because the doctors here are so stressed and exhausted.”

Dr Rastegar says she has been fighting the rezoning for three years.

“The last email I received from the (federal) Department of Health told me there would be no further opportunities to review or appeal the decision to not grant DPA status at this time,” she said.

“I have a responsibility to the patients and to the community to keep trying,” she said. “If I shut down, there is no one else.”

She says she is frustrated that her clinic has the same postcode as the nearby suburb of Somerville.

The medical centre will close its door one day a week from Wednesday because doctors are stressed and exhausted. Picture: iStock

“They are DPA, we are not. They have six giant medical centres with multiple doctors each. We are the only clinic in Pearcedale,” Dr Rastegar said.

Having exhausted appeals to the federal government, she says more than a thousand patients and retailers in Pearcedale have signed a petition to save the clinic.

“If this doesn’t change we will have to close the practice and I will go somewhere else to work. I feel the door has now closed on us.”

For patients such as Sarah Bacaller that would be devastating.

“I can’t emphasise enough what it has meant to my family to have the clinic. The clinic has become an essential part of the wellbeing of our community,” Ms Bacaller said.

The federal health department says it is conducting a review of the DPA program that is expected to be completed next year.