$4M HECS pay-off solution to solve Tasmania’s looming GP woes

Tasmania is facing a looming crisis of declining general practitioner numbers, and one professional body believes there’s a way to prevent it. Their proposal.

Generic image of a doctor. Photo: iStock

Tasmania’s looming crisis in general practitioner numbers could be averted by paying off the HECS debts of graduating doctors, in exchange for five years’ service in regional and rural parts of the state.

The GP-attraction scheme, included as part of a State Government budget submission by General Practice Training Tasmania (GPTT), would involve spending $4 million to settle the student debts of some 40 doctors, whose average HECS bills are $100,000 each.

GPTT chair Paul Viney said that answers were desperately required in a state where the full-time GP cohort was ready to retire, and where younger medicos were increasingly favouring part-time hours.

“The shortage of GPs, particularly in Tasmania with its ageing population, is beyond urgent,” Mr Viney said in a Talking Point article published in the Mercury today.

“It has become a looming emergency, demonstrated by communities not able to maintain a general practice service due to GP shortage.

“But there is a solution.”

Under the GPTT plan, contracted doctors would be placed in areas they were most needed, with Mr Viney saying that even a boost of 10 extra GPs in the state would have a significant positive effect on the state’s health system.

Mr Viney said HECS debt relief would be an especially attractive motivator to young doctors looking to start families – to both relocate to Tasmania, and to switch their specialty to general practice.“GPTT Inc maintains this solution would give Tasmania first-mover advantage attracting doctors from around Australia to the state,” he said.

Chair General Practice Training Tasmania Paul Viney

“From recent Royal Australian College of General Practice data shows only 12 per cent of Australian graduates are choosing to become GPs – six years ago it was 17 per cent and 30 years ago it was 45 per cent.”

Mr Viney estimated that $4 million represented just half the daily budget for the Tasmanian health system, but would result in an immediate boost to GPs available to the community.

He said that in the two decades his organisation trained Tasmanian GPs, before responsibilities were handed back to colleges by the federal government, it found that more than 80 per cent of doctors trained in the state remained in Tasmania.

“Our proposal has the capacity to immediately attract young GPs who have completed their training elsewhere, and already attained fellowship, to join the Tasmanian GP workforce,” Mr Viney said.

“The cost in relieving their HECS debt will be spread over time and is relatively small when considering the fact that the lack of GPs massively increases the cost to the State Government of operating its hospital and acute care systems, including ambulance services.”

Originally published as $4M HECS pay-off solution to solve Tasmania’s looming GP woes