By PAUL YANDALL
TAUMARUNUI - Rural GPs say serious medical mistakes are inevitable if a chronic shortage of doctors is not remedied quickly.
Doctors in South Waikato and Taumarunui are being stretched to breaking point by the shortage and believe patients' health will suffer further.
Taumarunui, a town with a rural population of 10,000, will have its shortage exacerbated when one of the town's three doctors leaves later this year.
Dr Gunawan Setiadarma quits his country practice in November, leaving Dr Upali Manu and Dr Harold Pfeffer to service the area.
"Serious mistakes are inevitable," Dr Manu said.
"This town needs five GPs. We struggle with four, it's been mad with three, it's impossible with two."
Dr Manu, who has worked in the small central North Island town for 27 years, said the situation was the worst he had seen.
Unless a replacement was found for Dr Setiadarma, he would be forced to be on call every second day as well as attending his normal surgery.
The ski season brought 2000 to 3000 more patients to the town's doctors each winter, he said.
"Five, seven thousand people each - it's just too much to handle. Someone will get hurt if we are forced to work when we are tired."
Dr Pfeffer said the ratio of doctor to patients should be 1 to 1500.
"We've got 10,000 people here. What does that tell you? It tells me we're in a crisis."
It was difficult to attract doctors to the region and retain them, he said.
A new roster for GPs in the South Waikato towns of Mangakino, Tokoroa and Putaruru could leave locals without a nearby doctor during weekends.
People falling ill in Mangakino could face a 76km trip to get medical help.
Ruapehu District Mayor Weston Kirton said more needed to be done at a community level to ensure the region received help.
He called for the establishment of a community trust that would set out to attract doctors to the region.
Mr Kirton said extra funding of $70,000 from the Health Funding Authority would go towards the formation of the trust.
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