Table 2 Health Status and Services
Theme | Description | Example |
|---|---|---|
Quality of Health care | Health service quality, professional relationships between registrars and patients, rural competency and new approaches | “… having registrars improved the quality.” (Supervisor 7) “… just for being in the community and knowing the community, will start some confidence and therefore has a better understanding and is going to be able to deliver care with a better understanding.” (Supervisor 2) “I think it’s always good, particularly in these smaller rural areas where younger people with new ideas bring those into practices. That has seemed to have been a benefit to the outcome of the program … some fresh ideas.” (Community 21) |
Accessibility | Access to doctors and services, decreased travel and decreased waiting times | “… by having the extra training, we’ve been able to get an increased access to doctors, so that’s very good.” (Community 6) “… [practices] are able to offer a service that they might not have been able to without [the registrars].” (Community 21) “… patients stop travelling for their primary care.” (Community 4) “… the waiting time is down to bugger all.” (Community 9) |
Continuity of Care | Patient continuity of care | “… because we’re a training practice … it means that we do have doctors that are here for a year or two, even if they’re just registrars, providing good continuity of care.” (Supervisor 3) “… the continuity of care after that teleconference … is where the registrars … come in really strongly.” (Health Staff 3) |
GP Workforce | Recruitment and retention of GPs and sustainability of health care practices and practitioners | “… the effect of having access to training for registrars in rural and remote communities has significantly influenced the ability to recruit and retain a medical workforce.” (Community 4) “[The localised GP training program]‘s been a revelation, to be honest with you and it’s stabilising the workforce.” (Community 9) |
Health Status | Community health outcomes | “we’re seeing … a lot better health outcomes for patients” (Community 8) “But it’s also encouraging the community, particularly the outlying communities, to take more responsibility for their health.” (Community 9) |
Preventative Health care | Health promotion and preventative healthcare activities | “… preventative health care … was definitely something that could not have been done without registrars.” (Supervisor 7) “… the interns last year attended our local show and ran a stall with one of the private practices here for a bit of people’s health scans … I think that that’s a hell of a good exposure … to be able to promote rural medicine and, as well as that, just provide … some good, healthy, outcomes.” (Community 8) |