“The Council is a conduit for community and local health staff who have issues and concerns they’d like communicated to the GSAHS,” Dr Stewart said.

The AHAC has ten formal meetings a year, and endeavours to visit as many local sites as possible to get a strong feel for the needs of separate areas.

“We chose Bombala for this particular meeting because of the new health service facility, and we were knocked out with the impressive appearance and functionality of the hospital,” Dr Stewart said.

“As a former medical practitioner I was particularly impressed to see the GP rooms are housed within the hospital, and as we spoke with Dr Pate it was obvious how effective this layout is.”

Dr Stewart explained that Dr Pate was just one member of the local health staff that the AHAC met with on Tuesday, with the nursing personnel and the Hospital Auxiliary also speaking with the group.

Bombala Council Mayor Bob Stewart, General Manager David Rawlings and a number of Councillors were also pleased to meet with the AHAC during the visit.

“Meeting with Council gives us a very useful perspective on what is happening in specific areas, and we had a good session with the Bombala Council which revealed the most important local issues,” Dr Stewart said.

GSAHS Chief Executive, Heather Gray was also in attendance to meet with locals, and Dr Stewart was very pleased to announce that she was able to solve three problems whilst visiting with the AHAC.

The formal monthly meeting was held on the Wednesday, with an area-wide focus being necessary as Ms Gray and Dr Stewart delivered their updates, and individual reports from each area were made.

“The big focuses once again were on the health workforce, Aboriginal health, mental health and transport,” Dr Stewart explained.

Of course low numbers within the health workforce is one of the most significant issues to Bombala, with Dr Stewart acknowledging that local staff are stretched to the limit.

“We are looking into options such as the increased use of non face to face communication to help fill the gap, with the possibility of getting retired health professionals to offer sessions through video conferencing to patients and an assisting nurse on the other end,” Dr Stewart said.

“This is a new and relatively untried concept, but could be of significant assistance to rural areas.”

Dr Stewart also focused on the rearrangement of the structure of GSAHS that has caused some concern amongst patients and staff.

“The restructure will see the area formed into East, Central and West sectors, and there will be separate management for each,” he explained.

“Patients will still be able to access the same health facilities as they have in the past, only the management of each of the areas should be improved.

“We have found it hard to receive good local information through the current cluster system, and trials of this restructure look very, very good.”

Dr Stewart said that the highlights of the Bombala visit were of course the new hospital facility, and Ms Gray’s opportunity to solve some local problems.

“But the overall positive experience and atmosphere were a great example of a community really wanting to be involved in its health service,” he said.