Submission

AMA submission on the redistribution of Commonwealth supported medical school places

The AMA was invited to provide a submission in response to the Discussion Paper – redistribution pool of medical places from the Department of Education.

In an attempt to address ongoing issues with the maldistribution of medical practitioners in rural and remote areas, 32 medical Commonwealth supported places will be redistributed to Charles Sturt University for a new rural medical program. An additional 28 places will be redistributed to other universities with strong rural programs using one of three potential strategies.

The Discussion Paper outlined the three potential options that the Department is considering for the redistribution process and invited stakeholder feedback on the preferred strategy. 

While the AMA agrees with the redistribution of Commonwealth Supported Places (CSPs) to support medical school training in rural areas we remain opposed to the one off decision to allow medical schools to increase their intake of full fee paying places in order to offset any net loss of CSP places. The AMA also highlighted that this redistribution will not be enough to address workforce shortages and maldistribution without continuing emphasis on increasing capacity in the prevocational and vocational medical training pipeline. 

 

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