Medical School, marine research centre closer to reality

Jul 15, 2005

The University of Wollongong's Graduate School of Medicine took a major step towards its projected February 2007 opening with a sod-turning ceremony for its first building at the University's Shoalhaven Campus today (July 15).

The Graduate School of Medicine (GSM) is designed to help overcome the acute shortage of doctors in many areas outside the capital cities by training doctors to work in regional, rural and remote areas.

It will be based at two facilities at the Shoalhaven Campus and at the University's main Wollongong Campus, providing students with experiences of working at hospitals and with doctors in regional and rural practices throughout their training.

The Shoalhaven Campus facility will include a clinical skills centre, tutorial rooms, common room and offices. The GSM will share the building with a new marine and aquaculture research centre to be called the Shoalhaven Marine and Freshwater Centre.

Construction should start in September and be completed by March or April next year.

Member for Gilmore Joanna Gash, who played a pivotal role in achieving Federal Government support and funding to establish the Medical School, was invited to perform the sod-turning.

Mrs Gash described it as a privilege to have been able to work with her community to gain such an important facility.

“This is the realisation of a dream, and I would really like to pay tribute to the local doctors and the Shoalhaven Division of General Practice who were so supportive,” Mrs Gash said.

The GSM's Foundation Dean Professor John Hogg said siting one section of the new Medical School in the Shoalhaven would be a major benefit for the South Coast.

“The Medical School is committed to training doctors to work in regional, rural and remote areas and we'll be discriminating in favour of people from those areas when recruiting our students,” Professor Hogg said.

“Having these students then train here means there will be a high chance of (the Shoalhaven) getting a lot of doctors who want to stay and work here after they graduate.

“And they'll be doctors of the highest quality, trained to work in General Practice and other specialties.”

Professor Hogg said the School's success depended on support from the community, and he had been greatly heartened by the level of support the School was receiving from the doctors and the general community in the Shoalhaven.

Acknowledging a formal welcome from local indigenous elder Uncle Ben Brown, Professor Hogg said he expected the Medical School would have a positive impact on health care for the area's indigenous people.

Dr Lyndal Parker-Newlyn, a Nowra doctor who chairs the Shoalhaven Division of General Practice, said the arrival of the Medical School in the Shoalhaven was an exciting development for the community and local doctors, who would have an opportunity to participate in the training of the next generation of doctors.

“It is so exciting to be involved in moulding future doctors, and engendering in them the love we have for working in country areas,” she said.

Dr Parker-Newlyn, who is also on the board of the Rural Doctors Network, said she believed it would be extremely valuable for local doctors to be involved in the Medical School and she had been delighted by the number who had already applied for honorary positions.

Meanwhile, the head of the Shoalhaven Marine and Freshwater Centre Director Associate Professor Ron West said his centre would focus strongly on building partnerships with government and industry to work on research projects.

There would be a strong emphasis on research into the sustainable management of the marine environment and water catchments of the South Coast, as well as aquaculture and other commercial marine and freshwater activities.

“The South Coast has really important lake systems, major rivers and marine environments like Jervis Bay,” Associate Professor West said. “We will be involved in research into their sustainable management as well as looking for research opportunities with exisiting aquaculture industries such as oyster farmers, while looking at ways to develop new industries.”

Professor West said he saw the centre as a link between groups and people in the region who could benefit from research projects, and the funding bodies that could finance that research.

He stressed that research generally required funding, and he was looking forward to working with a range of people on the South Coast to help them access research funding for worthwhile projects. He expected there would be opportunities to work with indigenous groups who had shown an interest in aquaculture projects.