MEDICAL students fear there will not be enough hospital internships available for them at South Australian hospitals in coming years, leaving them unable to be registered as doctors.
Figures collated by medical students’ associations at Flinders and Adelaide universities from the deans of the two medical schools indicate there will be a shortfall of 22 intern places in 2017, 39 in 2018 and 10 in 2019.
The students are caught in a federal-state government gridlock — the Federal Government funds student places but the State Government funds internships in state hospitals.
Student groups are planning a campaign lobbying state and federal MPs as well as Health Minister Jack Snelling to increase the number of internships.
Flinders University Medical Students Society president Nicholas Stock said students face missing places.
“It will get tougher and tougher and some will be left out in the cold,” he said.
“If you miss out in 2017 you have little hope of getting one in 2018 or 2019 and then basically you are done for — years of training and taxpayers’ money down the drain.
“It is scary for a lot of people. If you don’t do an internship you might be a medical graduate but you can’t practice as a doctor.
“Locally trained doctors are going to be forced to go interstate or overseas to get an internship — if they finish their intern year overseas then they are not qualified to work in Australia.”
Mr Stock said two special categories of internships providing more than 50 places had been scrapped in the past two years as funding ran out.
A priority system for selecting interns gives preferences to Australians citizens who trained in South Australia.
Mr Snelling said all South Australians who graduate would gain internships.
“All domestic students will have a place,” he said. “Students who tend to get displaced are overseas students but that is not our responsibility — our responsibility is to Australian domestic students.
“Universities are charging overseas students and it is up to the universities to make sure they are able to get their training.”
Holly Richter, 23, of Myrtle Bank, is two years into her four-year degree at Flinders University after previously completing a three-year medical science degree.
She will be one of 344 medical students from Flinders and Adelaide universities in the graduating class of 2017 seeking internships in 2018 — 39 more than are expected to be available.
“I am really concerned about it because obviously some people will miss out,” she said.
“Students who are aware of the issue are outraged but a lot are just assuming there will be enough places. I want to work here in SA, not have to go somewhere else.
“It is a very big difference in the numbers for my cohort and it is going to be tough for international students.