Bendigo Health will train up more than 40 interns this year to boost the prospect of recruiting doctors to central Victoria.
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The student doctors will continue to learn all facets of the industry over the next 12 months where they will undergo five rotations across different specialties, including emergency medicine and surgical training.
Around half of the interns came from the Monash regional clinical school with the vast majority of all of the interns having some experience in rural and regional areas.
Bendigo Health's supervisor of intern training Dr Amy Harding said there has been a boost in the number of young doctors staying in the area.
"This year we have also seen our retention rate from (last year's) intern to junior medial officer roles has been around 70 percent," she said.
"It has been variable but now we are starting to see that we have actually been able to develop end to end training so we have got many doctors with us now that started their internship here at Bendigo Health.
"(Doctors) who have done their pre-vocational training through to their specialty training and are now consultants here with us at Bendigo Health."
Team spirit
One of the interns who recently joined the Bendigo Health ranks was Dr Whitney James, who has already carried out some work at the hospital.
Dr James was excited to see what the next 12 months would bring.
She said the staff and the work environment were both key factors in wanting to do further study and work in the region.
"We both were able to do a bit of medical training here," she said.
"Also we got to really fall in love with the staff here and there is a really strong collegially, people catch up outside of work hours.
"(Bendigo Health) really wants to foster an environment where you feel comfortable to express ideas and to really contribute to the team."
