SERIOUS PROBLEM

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVII, Issue 7, 10 January 1944, Page 4

SERIOUS PROBLEM

SHORTAGE OF DOCTORS

RELIEF BADLY NEEDED

New Zealand is suffering from a shortage of doctors, but that the position has reached a very serious stage is probably not fully realised except by comparatively' few. On several occasions recently comments have been made by coroners on the difficulty of obtaining prompt medical attention, but there are dozens of other cases which are known only to those directly concerned. The shortage of doctors is, of course, j due to the war —to what may be considered by some as New Zealand's over-commitment of man-power, and for this the. medical profession itself cannot be in any way held responsible. The following figures show clearly what a very serious shortage of doctors now prevails. Before the war there were in New Zealand some 1200 registered medical practitioners. Not all of these were general practitioners: some were specialists, some were on hospital staffs, and others were doing special study both here and abroad. Altogether, there were between 900 and 1000 general practitioners, roughly, one to every 1500 persons in the country— a figure comparable to the state of affairs normally prevailing in England and other countries. ] The position has now altered very materially. No fewer than 352 of the doctors who formerly attended to the needs of the general public are now serving with the Armed Forces. In other words, well over one-third of the Dominion's general practitioners are no longer available. CITIES HARD HIT. It will be brought more forcibly home to the public what this shortage of doctors means if the two chief cities are considered. Before the war there used to be 40 general practitioners in the Wellington urban area, available for night work: now there are only 12 left to respond to night calls. Recently in the NewtownIsland Bay area there has been but one general practitioner for a population numbering about 40,000. It requires no great stretch of imagination to visualise this doctor not being available when urgently needed. But Auckland is even worse off. Its much larger urban area has only 13 general practitioners available for urgent night calls. ; Commenting on the above figures, a prominent official of the British Medical Association said that they should make it obvious that the shortage of doctors is very real. "But," he added, "there are other and aggravating factors which are not always taken into account by those who would seek to blame the medical profession for the present state of affairs and who are naturally annoyed when repeated attempts to secure the services of a medical man fail. One of these is the shortage of petrol, of which doctors do not have an. unlimited supply, contrary to the belief of some people. A doctor in the city may receive an urgent call to go to Ngaio or Khandallah, say, but not having sufficient j petrol for such extraneous travelling in addition to his normal rounds, he is forced to decline to go. MORE WORK FOR THE DOCTORS. "Then again the average general practitioner, who was by no means idle before the war, now has eyer so much more work to do —there is no 40-hour or five-day week for him. Besides the big increase in the number of his patients, he is in many cases spending a good many hours a week medically examining recruits or doing duty on one or other of numerous medical boards." In reply to a question about what steps had been or could be taken to alleviate the position, the "Post's" representative was told that the B.M.A. had asked the appropriate' authorities to release a number of medical men for civilian service. "The only solution to the problem is, of j course, more doctors for general practitioner work," continued the "Post's" | informant. "But where are they; coming from? Some, it is true, are | returning into general practitioner ser-, vice after service with the forces overseas, but there are not many, and some of them are badly in need of a rest after the arduous time they have been through. HOSPITALS GET RECRUITS. "It must be remembered, too, that the general practitioner ranks are not receiving the supply of recruits which would be the case in normal times; in fact, they are receiving none at all. Every newly-qualified doctor is at once directed to a hospital—he has no option in the matter —and later he goes into the Armed Forces. Even then, hospitals, with their ever-increasing number of patients, are not over-staff-ed, although they are better off in the matter of man-power than are general practitioners. "Everything possible is being done to organise our depleted forces to the I best advantage of the public. A doctor is, after all, a human being, and needs some time for sleep and recreation if he is to continue to work efficiently, and critics of the medical profession should recollect that some of our general practitioners are past retiring age and yet are gamely carrying on to tide over this time of emergency. ' At weekends, when some doctors may be away, a roster operates, which ensures medical attention being available in cases of emergency. But without a sufficient number of doctors to meet normal needs, there will inevitably arise occasions when it is difficult to get the immediate attention of a medical man. For this the already over-worked medical profession is not to blame."