❓ The Minister for Health outlines initiatives to attract and retain medical professionals in WA, particularly in regional areas, focusing on mental health workforce expansion and support for nurses and midwives returning to practice.
AnsweredQoN 142Legislative Assembly
QuestionView source ↗
HEALTHCARE WORKFORCE —
RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION
142. Ms C.M. COLLINS to the Minister for Health:
I refer to the McGowan Labor
government's significant investment in the expansion of Western Australia's
public health system capacity. Can the minister update the house on how this
investment, including new workforce initiatives, will help attract and retain
medical professionals throughout the state?
RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION
142. Ms C.M. COLLINS to the Minister for Health:
I refer to the McGowan Labor
government's significant investment in the expansion of Western Australia's
public health system capacity. Can the minister update the house on how this
investment, including new workforce initiatives, will help attract and retain
medical professionals throughout the state?
AnswerView source ↗
I thank the member for Hillarys for
her question. I also want to acknowledge that today is Thank Your Pharmacist
Day, so thank you to all our pharmacists—community pharmacists, those
who work in aged care and also those who work in primary care.
On Saturday night I was very
fortunate to be able to attend the Rural Health West Excellence Awards, which
honour our practitioners who work across this enormous state of ours in varying
and sometimes very challenging conditions and communities. They often deal with
patient cohorts that have the most complex healthcare needs and often work in
very remote locations.
I want to highlight one particular
practitioner, Dr Jared Watts. He is director of obstetrics and gynaecology at
the WA Country Health Service and was the
winner of the Specialist of the Year Award. He was born at Broome Hospital and operates out of what is now Broome Health Campus. He is an outstanding
practitioner. The Kimberley women whom he treats during his remote and outreach
clinics affectionately call him ''the ladies' doctor''
and welcome him into their sacred space of secret women's business. In
addition to his work in country Western Australia, he also volunteers his
skills internationally, teaching in Cambodia and Laos, and also as an
obstetrics/gynaecology specialist for Medecins Sans Fronti�res Australia in
Nigeria and Syria. I want to congratulate all the nominees and winners at the
Rural Health West Excellence Awards last weekend.
I want to provide an update to the
house on what we are doing to supercharge the mental health workforce,
particularly in regional areas, with the rural psychiatry training pathway.
This is the first of its kind in this country. Credit to the clinicians and
practitioners who came up with this idea and put it together, and to the Mental
Health Commission, which has fully backed it in, with the support of the state
government. We know that there is a critical shortage of psychiatrists across
the state that is particularly acute in remote and regional areas. Doctors who
train in the regions are more likely to stay in the regions. Late last year,
when I was in Bunbury with I think the member for Hillarys and the member for
Collie–Preston, we launched the rural psychiatry training pathway. It
was heavily subscribed, with over 40 applications, and 23 trainees were accepted,
of whom eight will be based in the south west, six in the great southern, four
in the Kimberley and one in both the midwest and the wheatbelt, with a further
three to start training later this year. This is an increase of 280 per cent
from the six trainees allocated to the rural pathway, all of whom were based in
Perth. They are now training in the regions, and we know that people who train
in the regions are much more likely to stay in those communities. Trainee
numbers are limited only by the availability
of supervising psychiatrists. By creating this program, we will be expanding
the availability of supervising psychiatrists. We are delighted with the
interest from doctors in training who want to do rural psychiatry and very
hopeful that we will continue to recruit significant numbers of psychiatrists
into regional areas.
The
other area in which we are supporting our clinicians who have left the
profession is by retraining and re-registering nurses and midwives.
Through the Office of the Chief Nurse, the government is paying the fees of
nurses and midwives to complete a retraining course as part of their return to
work. We are supporting newly qualified nurses and midwives with their
education to transition to the healthcare workforce with transition-to-practice
programs, because we know that those first six weeks back in practice are often
the most daunting and most challenging, so that they will feel supported and
empowered and want to stay in that position.
We are also investing in our models
of care so that practitioners can actually work in them. We know and I know
that there is a lot of untapped skill and goodwill among our healthcare
workforce that is not being put to use now, for
various reasons, whether it is cultural, policy or regulatory. We have very
highly competent nurses and midwives who are not able to work to their
full competencies. We are certainly looking in the emergency medicine space and mental health space at where we can use those
practitioners, focusing particularly on the report of the infants, children
and adolescents mental health task force so that we can upskill and uplift
their available support for those communities.
her question. I also want to acknowledge that today is Thank Your Pharmacist
Day, so thank you to all our pharmacists—community pharmacists, those
who work in aged care and also those who work in primary care.
On Saturday night I was very
fortunate to be able to attend the Rural Health West Excellence Awards, which
honour our practitioners who work across this enormous state of ours in varying
and sometimes very challenging conditions and communities. They often deal with
patient cohorts that have the most complex healthcare needs and often work in
very remote locations.
I want to highlight one particular
practitioner, Dr Jared Watts. He is director of obstetrics and gynaecology at
the WA Country Health Service and was the
winner of the Specialist of the Year Award. He was born at Broome Hospital and operates out of what is now Broome Health Campus. He is an outstanding
practitioner. The Kimberley women whom he treats during his remote and outreach
clinics affectionately call him ''the ladies' doctor''
and welcome him into their sacred space of secret women's business. In
addition to his work in country Western Australia, he also volunteers his
skills internationally, teaching in Cambodia and Laos, and also as an
obstetrics/gynaecology specialist for Medecins Sans Fronti�res Australia in
Nigeria and Syria. I want to congratulate all the nominees and winners at the
Rural Health West Excellence Awards last weekend.
I want to provide an update to the
house on what we are doing to supercharge the mental health workforce,
particularly in regional areas, with the rural psychiatry training pathway.
This is the first of its kind in this country. Credit to the clinicians and
practitioners who came up with this idea and put it together, and to the Mental
Health Commission, which has fully backed it in, with the support of the state
government. We know that there is a critical shortage of psychiatrists across
the state that is particularly acute in remote and regional areas. Doctors who
train in the regions are more likely to stay in the regions. Late last year,
when I was in Bunbury with I think the member for Hillarys and the member for
Collie–Preston, we launched the rural psychiatry training pathway. It
was heavily subscribed, with over 40 applications, and 23 trainees were accepted,
of whom eight will be based in the south west, six in the great southern, four
in the Kimberley and one in both the midwest and the wheatbelt, with a further
three to start training later this year. This is an increase of 280 per cent
from the six trainees allocated to the rural pathway, all of whom were based in
Perth. They are now training in the regions, and we know that people who train
in the regions are much more likely to stay in those communities. Trainee
numbers are limited only by the availability
of supervising psychiatrists. By creating this program, we will be expanding
the availability of supervising psychiatrists. We are delighted with the
interest from doctors in training who want to do rural psychiatry and very
hopeful that we will continue to recruit significant numbers of psychiatrists
into regional areas.
The
other area in which we are supporting our clinicians who have left the
profession is by retraining and re-registering nurses and midwives.
Through the Office of the Chief Nurse, the government is paying the fees of
nurses and midwives to complete a retraining course as part of their return to
work. We are supporting newly qualified nurses and midwives with their
education to transition to the healthcare workforce with transition-to-practice
programs, because we know that those first six weeks back in practice are often
the most daunting and most challenging, so that they will feel supported and
empowered and want to stay in that position.
We are also investing in our models
of care so that practitioners can actually work in them. We know and I know
that there is a lot of untapped skill and goodwill among our healthcare
workforce that is not being put to use now, for
various reasons, whether it is cultural, policy or regulatory. We have very
highly competent nurses and midwives who are not able to work to their
full competencies. We are certainly looking in the emergency medicine space and mental health space at where we can use those
practitioners, focusing particularly on the report of the infants, children
and adolescents mental health task force so that we can upskill and uplift
their available support for those communities.
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