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LA TROBE University students believe a new medical school proposed for Bendigo will provide more local opportunities for students wanting to become rural doctors.
The students were gathering signatures for a petition in the Bendigo Marketplace on Saturday, calling on the federal government to commit $50 million for the Murray Darling Medical School.
The school was proposed to be based in Bendigo, Wagga Wagga and Orange.
La Trobe paramedicine student Ryan Layton said adding more opportunities for rural students to study medicine in Bendigo would be a positive for the region.
“When people study rurally, they’re more likely to work rurally,” he said.
“It’s about training fewer doctors in Melbourne.
“The Murray Darling Medical School would be part of the solution to solving the rural doctor shortage.”
Bendigo already hosts a Rural Clinical School which offers places to rural students, run by Monash and Melbourne universities.
The MDMS, to be run between La Trobe and Charles Sturt universities, would offer increased time studying in a country area compared with rural clinical schools.
The Australian Medical Students Association opposes the plan and believes the funding should instead be used to increase specialist training outside of the capital cities. Other local graduates say the new Bendigo Hospital should be used to increase specialist training opportunities outside of Melbourne.
They say there are already enough medical graduates, but not enough of them are encouraged to stay regional after the completion of their degree.
Currently, almost all medicine graduates are required to complete their specialist training - taking up to six years - in a capital city.
The La Trobe students planned to take their petition across rural Victoria, moving on to Shepparton after Bendigo.
It states the medical school would “train local kids to become local doctors cheaply and more effectively than metropolitan medical schools”.
The $50 million would come over four years, to train 180 students across Bendigo, Orange and Wagga per year.
The Nationals committed their support to the project but were unable to secure a funding commitment in the last election campaign.