Rural Clinical School Extension Boost for Burnie

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PDF printable version of Rural Clinical School Extension Boost for Burnie (PDF 18 KB)

7 October 2009

The growing popularity of the University of Tasmania’s Rural Clinical School at Burnie has been recognised today with the Minister for Health and Ageing, Nicola Roxon, officially opening an extension to the school.

The Rudd Government has provided $1.1 million for the extension and furnishings which are needed to cater for the growing number of students, clinical supervisors, researchers and professionals in the wider health community who are being attracted to the region.

There are currently a total of 41 students at the Rural Clinical School undertaking their clinical training in Burnie. The extension will support even more students - with 55 expected to undertake training at the facility in 2010.

These additional facilities will also support other rural undergraduate and postgraduate clinical education programs in the Cradle Coast Region.

The extension includes areas for teaching research and administration activities, new teaching spaces, a clinical skills and simulation centre, a study hub, breakout rooms for small meetings, clinical consulting rooms and a student lounge.

This project has enabled the University of Tasmania to form a partnership with HealthCare, the owner of the North West Private Hospital. This partnership will help to respond and address local health needs and will benefit the health professional community in the region through the extension of training opportunities for current staff, and the expansion of teaching and learning across the disciplines

The Rural Clinical School Program has proved to be crucial in the training of young doctors to ease the shortage of medical professionals in rural and regional areas of Australia.

The University of Tasmania Rural Clinical School is part of a network of 17 Rural Clinical schools, managed by 16 universities, across Australia. The schools are supported by the requirement that 25 per cent of Commonwealth-supported medical students undertake at least one year of their undergraduate clinical training in rural areas.

Following the opening, Ms Roxon conducted the latest consultation in the Rudd Government's community meetings to discuss improving the health care system.

The Rudd Government is taking concrete steps to improve Australia’s health and hospital system after twelve years of neglect by the previous Liberal Government.

The North West Regional Hospital consultation is first to be held in Tasmania the 50th consultation across the country to road test the National Health and Hospital Reform Commission’s proposed reforms.

At today’s consultation, Minister Roxon outlined the Commission’s recommendations and met with local health professionals to discuss their priorities to improve health services around the country.

All Australians are also able to contribute to the national debate on our health system via the yourhealth.gov.au website – and full copies of the reports can be found there.

For all media inquiries, please contact the Minister's Office on 02 6277 7220.