Junior doctor training needs urgent action

New Zealand's junior doctor workforce is characterised by long standing dissatisfaction, industrial conflict and many poor training experiences according to the Resident Medical Officer (RMO) Commission Report released by Health Minister Tony Ryall today.

"The RMO Commission report paints a grim picture of a junior doctor's experience in our public health system and calls for immediate change" said Mr Ryall.

"Junior doctors are our future, yet this report says they have felt undervalued and unsupported for years. RMOs should be apprentices learning on the job but the report writers conclude District Health Boards and senior doctors need to take much greater responsibility for mentoring and pastoral care."

The Report calls for urgent improvements to the apprenticeship model and recommends senior doctors be supported to play a much greater role and District Health Boards be held accountable for RMO training. It calls for a single national training body to ensure that training and the apprenticeship model drives resident doctors' experiences, not the other way round. The newly announced Clinical Training Agency Board will assume this responsibility.

RMOs presently move around the country being employed by different DHBs. In another recommendation the RMO Commission Report proposes a single national employer to manage their employment while they are in training.

"This particular recommendation would require either legislative change or new industrial arrangements. It is controversial and I will be referring it to the DHBs for comment," said Mr Ryall.

The RMO Commission was established by the previous government last year and is now disestablished.