Territory students will have first dibs at new CDU NT medical school

Territorians are lining up to attend the brand new, federally funded medical school. See who the first students will be.

Territory students will be given priority at Charles Darwin University’s new medical school when it begins operating.

NT Medical School foundation Dean, Dianne Stephens, said preference would be given to first nation Territorians and NT residents, with First Nations students and remote and rural students from the rest of Australia next in line.

“We are going to be the medical school of choice for studying medicine for First Nations people,” she said.

“We are going to make sure we are the best.”

In a surprising move, the university is hoping to leverage up to $7m over five years from the NT Government in addition to the Commonwealth’s $24.6m to begin operating the school at the commencement of the 2025 university year, a year ahead of schedule.

Thevini Abeywardana Announcement of CDU Menzies Medical School

If the bid is successful, former Darwin High School student Thevini Abeywardana could be among the first student intake.

She chose to stay in Darwin and complete a biomedical science degree rather than travel interstate and study medicine – but is busting to study to be a doctor in the Territory.

“I want to learn medicine and then go to regional and remote communities and help other communities there and going on placements as well as being close to my family,” Ms Abeywardana said.

She said there are Territory medicine students studying interstate who would also return.

“They tell me everyday how much they miss staying here and how often they have to come back and forth, going back to Darwin and university and I think it’s an amazing opportunity for students to be able to study medicine,” she said.

Professor Stephens said the Territory is “desperate” for doctors and the new school will help plug the considerable gaps in our health workforce.

CDU medical school May 2024.

“We are desperate for medical workforce across the board,” Professor Stephens said.

“It’s in the hospitals, it’s in Aboriginal controlled community sector and it’s in general practice. Any person in the community can tell you how hard it is to get into see a doctor and what the waiting lists are.

“Our hospital system is under stress, there is a medical workforce deficit across the country, and it’s amplified and much worse in the Northern Territory. Those doctors that would normally have taken up jobs in the Northern Territory are taking up jobs in their own states.”

Work is already underway on a stand-alone medical school adjacent to the health campus which will be run by CDU’s faculty of health.

Solomon MP Luke Gosling said the Territory would now be in a position to train and employ its own doctors.

“Doctors from here for here,” he said.

The NT budget, which chief minister and treasurer Eva Lawler will present on Tuesday, was finalised before the federal government announced the school, but Government left open the option of funding the school out-of-budget.