The meeting on Thursday between Bendigo MP Lisa Chesters, assistant health minister Ged Kearney and local organisations Bendigo Primary Health Care, Murray PHN, and Bendigo Community Health Services primarily discussed the GP shortage in rural and regional areas.

BCHS executive leader of better health Graem Kelly said doctor shortages, seeing better service integration and health system issues formed part of the meetings agenda.

READ MORE

"It was a great opportunity to explore the complexities that are arising in the lack of GPs in the Bendigo and the greater region," he said.

"As we know, presently, after hours GP services are very difficult to access. It's difficult to access GPs in aged residential care. All those needs plus the numbers of GPs that are available in Bendigo are a real issue that needs to be focused on.

"It won't be a quick fix, and it won't be an easy fix but I'm sure after today, they can feel more confident being aware of the issues that face Bendigo and the greater region."

Ms Kearney said the "crisis that is the GP shortage in rural and regional areas" extended to all parts of the health system.

"It's not only GPs but the broader health care workforce including allied health professionals and nursing staff," she said.

"People living in a rural and regional area only too familiar with the difficulties in getting in to see a GP.

"There are lots of things to work on. As a federal government as the assistant health minister, we are 100 per cent focused on the workforce (and) the pipeline of GPs and other health professionals for rural and regional areas."

Ms Chesters said local providers had ideas on how to solve the GP shortage problem.

"What was really exciting about that discussion we just had was to have the minister here learning and hearing firsthand the possible solutions," she said.

"Bouncing around how we could work out a short term and a long term fix to this crisis is warming for me and exciting.

"It's no surprise that we're here at Bendigo Primary Health Care where we've got the hospital behind us, we've got La Trobe across from us and Monash Health as well.

"You can just see the potential here to be a model to help fix the challenges that we have."

Ms Kearney said Ms Chesters had spoken a lot about the issues with health care in rural and regional Victoria.

"Local members like Lisa, who represent people in regional and remote areas, are telling us that this is the number one issue for their constituents. They want to be able to access health care," Ms Kearney said.

"So these are the issues that we are working on at a federal government level.

"We know we need to (also) work closely with the state government level, because part of the other big issue is how our big, state-run hospitals interact with our federally-funded and federally-run primary care facilities. That's another big issue."

Ms Chesters said it had been more than 10 years since a federal health minister had visited the region to speak with local health groups.

"Being in opposition was incredibly frustrating. All I could do was write a letter to the Minister and beg them to come to Bendigo and they just never did," she said.

"So to have the minister here, before we even get back to Canberra, knowing that Ged will be able to share her experience with our team, is great news.

"There are five ministers in the health team that just demonstrates how much of a priority primary health care is and regional primary health care is for Labor."

If you're reading this it's because you're a loyal subscriber to the Bendigo Advertiser. If you want to get more out of your subscription join the discussion on the Bendigo Advertiser's subscriber group on Facebook today.