RACGP Townsville hub boosts GP training and healthcare

It’s not every day a commercial news crew comes to do a story on the opening of a new office.
 
But if there was any doubt of the significance of the RACGP having a new bricks-and-mortar base in a regional community, then 7NEWS Townsville put that to rest.
 
Wednesday’s opening of the new RACGP office in Townsville is physical proof of the RACGP’s commitment to the future of general practice and community healthcare across North and Far-North Queensland, says RACGP Rural Chair and local GP Associate Professor Michael Clements.
 
But a chance to spruik the new facility on local television doesn’t hurt either.
 
‘It’s just another opportunity to showcase the specialty of general practice, and who it is and what do we do,’ Associate Professor Clements told newsGP.
 
‘And it’s a chance to educate the community on the importance of specialist general practitioners in the community.’
 
The new office, located in Townsville’s CBD, will support RACGP activities across North and Far North Queensland and further strengthen partnerships with local healthcare providers, training organisations and community stakeholders.
 
Opened with a Welcome to Country, the road to Wednesday’s office opening was ‘years in the making’, said Associate Professor Clements, with much of that time spent looking for the perfect location.
 
‘I’ve been involved with vetting some of the places where we didn’t go,’ he said.
 
‘I’ve visited many sites in Townsville where we were exploring, but this is the one that we’ve settled on, so we’re talking years of work in getting to that.
 
‘It feels like too long, but we certainly needed to be clear about our member money and member investment, so where we decided to put our footprint needed to be cost efficient and fiscally responsible, but at the same time needed to be functional.’
 
The Townsville office will support GP training, help grow the local medical workforce, and aims to encourage more doctors to pursue a career in specialist general practice closer to home, said Associate Professor Clements.
 
‘When people are thinking about their training and whether they’re going to choose general practice … those same people are going to see and know this physical place as a place that is there to support them,’ he said.
 
‘It’s a touchpoint for them to come and engage with the college proper, and not think of the college as some ethereal, distant, city based entity that is calling the shots from somewhere else.’
 
On Monday he relished watching day one of operations unfold, as staff members saw their new desks for the first time, and medical educators tried out the seats trainees will soon occupy.
 
‘It’s lovely to walk in and smell that new building smell, that new paint and new wood smell that happens when you walk into a new place – it was beautiful,’ he said.
 
‘We’ve often been accused in the past of being an urban-centric college of GP training, but that’s simply not borne out by the evidence; it’s the regional offices like this that show that the RACGP understands that bricks and mortar helps.
 
‘As part of college-led training, we recognise that physical space identity – a location, a consistent place for people to work and come and see the college, to access everything for member issues and member support all the way through to teaching, training, and then the employees of the college working from here – really does showcase that commitment.’
 
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