DAN MOSKOVITZ (HE/HIM)
Student Health has gone exclusive with Kelburn campus, temporarily leaving Pipitea citing a shortage of GPs. But don’t worry Pipitea. Student Health still loves you, and it will return in September.
If you’re broken up about Student Health’s temporary break-up with you, the good news is that their counseling service, alongside a nurse and admin staff, will continue to operate at Pipitea as normal.
In addition, they’ve set up spaces at Pipitea for virtual consultation with the Kelburn-based GPs, and are providing taxi chits for students who need in-person appointments. So it’s not completely no-contact.
Why? Student Health doesn’t have the energy to commit to two campuses right now. As associate director Kevin Rowlatt explains, Student Health got hit with an unlucky conflux of GPs leaving, GPs taking annual leave, and GPs departing for personal reasons simultaneously. The current GP shortage in Aotearoa—about 500 practitioners—hasn’t helped, either.
“We thought we would bring all the GPs up to Kelburn so that we avoided having only one or two GPs operating at Kelburn and one at Pipitea, ” said Rowlatt.
“It’s just safer practice.”
And more GPs are on the way.
“It takes about three to six months to recruit a GP in the current environment,” said Rowlatt. “Given the current competition for GPs and nurses, we’ve done extremely well to replace those that have left permanently.
“I'm quite pleased. It happened a lot more quickly than I dreamed it would.”
The failure of successive governments has led to the current shortage, as the ten-year journey to become a GP just can’t produce enough replacements for those retiring.
“We need real bipartisan commitment to ensure primary care is funded correctly and an attractive proposition for doctors,” said Rowlatt.