Money For Medics: Britain's Cash Offer To Attract Australian Doctors
The UK's plan to offer $34,000 to Australian doctors to work and live overseas is a wake up call, according to the country's peak medical body.
Britain's National Health Service will offer cash incentives to both Australian-trained and British GPs who have relocated in efforts to plug its current shortage of family doctors.
Chair of the Australian Medical Association's Council of General Practice Dr Richard Kidd said the inducement could appear attractive to in-demand GPs who are feeling undervalued and overworked amid changing work practices.
"For far too long, there has been an active disinvestment in general practice and now this inducement is going to look very tempting for a lot of our doctors," Kidd told ten daily.
"We need to rapidly try and make general practice much more viable and sustainable, otherwise we could lose a number of our own when we already have shortages, particularly in regional or rural areas."
Details of the recruitment plan were outlined at the Royal College of GPs' annual conference in Glasgow on Thursday, including a target of 2000 foreign doctors by 2020/21.
The move has been likened to a similar push from the London Ambulance Service to attract Australian paramedics in recent years. While they are different professions, Kidd said it underlies the risks to Australia's medical workforce that is held in "high regard".
But he warned doctors could be moving from the "frying pan to the fire".
England has a desperate need to replace doctors they can no longer recruit from outside the European Economic Area, in the aftermath of Brexit.
Staff vacancies in the NHS have reportedly increased by nearly 10 percent in the last three months due to unmanageable workloads and increasing demands, despite national and international recruitment campaigns to attract health workers.
"It would appear that if you were one of the doctors that took this on, you've very likely to be going into areas where there is a shortage," he said.
"The NHS is set up differently and it may well be that you're expected to work very long hours for a very large population, dealing with everything that comes through your door."
He warned tempted Australian GPs to carefully consider the fine print before jumping ship.
"I'd also encourage them to look at the various incentives and resources that are being put in place for GPs to move into our rural or regional areas," he said.
ten daily has contacted the Minister for Health for comment.
Contact the author: ebrancatisano@networkten.com.au