Queensland welcomes 105 new GP Fellows

At a time when GPs are needed ‘more than ever’, the RACGP has welcomed 105 new Fellows in Queensland at a ceremony in Brisbane this week.
 
Alongside the graduates celebrating an achievement more than a decade in the making, the college also announced four award recipients for the state who have shown an ‘exemplary commitment’ to patient care in their communities.
 
 RACGP President Dr Nicole Higgins was there to congratulate the new Fellows.
 
‘Australia needs specialist GPs more than ever,’ she said.
 
‘Every year more than 4.6 million Queenslanders, more than 83% of the state’s population, choose to see a GP for their essential healthcare.’
 
Dr Higgins highlighted how the cohort will help grow the regional GP workforce, with support from new incentives in the state.
 
‘Recent incentives to support GPs to train in rural Queensland have helped boost GP numbers in areas that need it most,’ she said.
 
‘Research shows GPs who train in a rural community are far more likely to work there, so this is growing our future rural GP workforce.’
 
Graduate Dr Bushra Asif shared her journey with the crowd, as a young mum with a child with special needs who scored the highest marks in the state for her clinical exams and won the Mary Mahoney Examination Prize.
 
‘I had a three-month-old baby when I appeared in my Fellowship exams,’ she told newsGP.
 
‘Exams and training itself is demanding, but then I had a lot of extra responsibilities because of my family and young kids, so juggling all of that was a little bit challenging for me.’
 
Dr Asif says she got into general practice due to the rapport and trust you build with patients and their families.
 
‘I have worked quite a few years in hospitals before getting into the GP world and I was seeing the patients and then going, and I don’t know where they go after that,’ she said.
 
‘But the connection that we develop in general practice, we are the specialists in their lives, so we know everything from birth until death.
 
‘Of course, I do enjoy the medical part of the things that we do, but this is something else, a connection, a trust that our patients have.’

RACGP President Dr Nicole Higgins with new Fellow Dr Bushra Asif. (Image: supplied)
 
RACGP Queensland Chair Dr Cathryn Hester said the RACGP Fellows will provide invaluable care to patients, from big cities to regional and remote parts of the state.
 
‘Being a GP is such a rewarding job, every day is an opportunity to have a positive impact on the wellbeing of your community’ she said.
 
‘We’ve had great success bringing GPs in training to rural and remote areas where they are needed most, and this will help to boost our rural GP workforce in Queensland.’
 
The ceremony’s award winners also included Dr Isobel Walker, who was recognised for her outstanding work as a primary supervisor of GPs in training with the Queensland GP of the Year award.
 
Dr Anne-Maree Nielson, a proud Wakka Wakka woman of the South Burnett region, was honoured with the Queensland General Practitioner in Training of the Year award.
 
Dr Nielson has, for well over a decade, dedicated her career to improving Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander healthcare as a researcher, registered nurse, and now a doctor.
 
The Queensland General Practice of the Year award went to Growlife Medical.
 
The Queensland GP Supervisor of the Year award went to Dr Lisa Fraser – a Gordonvale-based GP who has demonstrated knowledge, care and commitment to GP registrars.
 
And for Dr Asif, she has now set her sights on continuing with the RACGP as a medical educator.
 
‘I’ve been doing voluntary teaching since last year when I did my exam, so I’ve been helping others successfully, quite a few candidates who were unable to pass their exams for a few years, and that has been very encouraging for me,’ she said.
 
‘It’s just my passion, and that’s what I want to continue.’
 
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