not enough jobs for junior docs (part 4) ...and yet more Medical Schools...

"CURTIN, Charles Sturt and the University of South Australia will press ahead with their plans to create new medical schools."

In the midst of concerns about intern positions for medical graduates, 3 universities have announced their intent to move forward with plans for more medical schools (and more medical students). Australia is apparently not training enough doctors.

It is undeniable that there is a shortage in the medical workforce, especially in rural areas. However, the bottleneck in training is not at the medical school level. In order to produce doctors that are able to work independently and service areas of medical workforce disadvantage we need to create the supervised junior and training positions to provide vocational training.

Without adequate resourcing of junior medical positions, including indemnity (which is potentially a barrier for moving training into the private sector), and adequate resourcing of the time needed from senior doctors to provide the supervision that junior doctors require, bumping up the number of medical graduates does very little to improve workforce shortages. It makes absolutely no sense to increase the number of medical schools and thereby increase the number of medical students, until the issue of adequate supervised junior positions and vocational training is resolved.

Senior medical folk associated with the universities need to seriously consider wisdom of creating new medical schools at this point in time. If the unit you work in is unable to accommodate any more junior doctor positions (due to funding or availability of adequate supervision) then the rationale for increasing the number of medical graduates is probably difficult to justify.