AMA not happy with proposed national register of doctors

The Australian Medical Association (AMA) says a national register of doctors to protect patients from rogue practitioners may do more harm than good.

According to AMA president Rosanna Capolingua, a model proposed by the Government would remove the current "checks and balances" provided by state-based registers and accreditation systems and would only serve to may make matters worse.

Dr. Capolingua says the AMA is concerned that the proposal for a national register of medical specialists will in fact, may make things worse and will not offer patients better protection.

Federal Government plans to regulate doctors, with a national register of medical specialists is due to be debated at the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) summit in Adelaide tomorrow.

The Federal Health Minister Nicola Roxon says the register will ensure higher standards of patient care and prevent rogue doctors from slipping through the checks.

At present the current system for registration of health professionals is administered by medical boards in each state and territory and the new proposal would replace that with a national process overseen by nine separate boards for each of the different health professions.

Dr. Capolingua says at present doctors registered in one state who have been suspended or have had conditions of practice imposed, would be denied registration in other states.

Dr. Capolingua says a national register would not prevent incidents such as those involving the so-called Butcher of Bega, former NSW doctor Graeme Reeves, and Queensland's 'Doctor Death' Dr. Jayant Patel, as these incidents were confined within their particular states.

Dr. Capolingua says the AMA has a better system on offer which they have been working on for two years and their national data base of doctors would be useful to current state-based medical boards when checking bona fides.

However Andrew Schwarz from the Australian Doctors Trained Overseas Association does not agree and says the current system of registration by the colleges has kept many overseas-trained doctors from practising in Australia.

Dr. Schwarz says the colleges are private bodies and are not meant to be the registration authority for the country; he says they have a vested interest in keeping numbers down and want to maintain control of the system.

At present Dr. Patel is in custody in the United States awaiting extradition to Australia, where he faces 16 charges, including three counts of manslaughter, grievous bodily harm and fraud related to alleged botched operations he performed in Queensland's Bundaberg Base Hospital.

Dr. Reeves, who was first banned from obstetric work in 1997 and struck off in 2004 when found to be working in defiance of the ban, is accused of a string of botched surgeries, inappropriate internal and breast examinations and verbal abuse.

Reeves is currently at the centre of police investigation Strike Force Tarella and the case has also been referred to the special commission of inquiry into NSW's health system, headed by Peter Garling.

Despite the opposition from the AMA, the Federal Government is pushing ahead with the plan and Health Minister Nicola Roxon says the scheme could help identify rogue doctors earlier.