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By her own admission, Ewa Piejko has a chaotic work life.

The Bendigo Health board member is a general practitioner in Strathfieldsaye, medical advisor for Murray PHN, helps train GPs, lectures for Monash University and is an examiner for the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners.

She’s also the Clinical Director of St Anthony’s Family Medical Practice, which has practices throughout the Loddon Mallee Region.

As she explains, the various roles keep her finger on the pulse.  

“It gives me a good understanding of the region and the issues are in the front of my mind not the back of my mind…it does make life a bit chaotic but at the same time it keeps me interested and broadens my scope and knowledge,” she said.

Since she began practicing in Bendigo in 2006, Dr Piejko has seen the GP landscape change markedly.

“There is probably a physical shortage in (GP numbers) but a lot of our time is now spent seeing regular patients to manage chronic diseases and mental health issues,” she said.

Dr Piejko said the majority of mental health problems in the community are dealt with by GPs, with hospital-led mental health services “just the tip of the iceberg”.

More GPs working part-time and more onerous paperwork requirements were also impacting the number of appointments available to the community, she said.

Ewa was working in a hospital as a junior Doctor when she decided to begin training as a GP.

“I quite liked the notion of developing good relationships with patients and the variety of work on offer. Even now I look after multiple generations of families…it’s very rewarding,” she said.

Ewa said anecdotally speaking, the number of GP trainees in the Loddon Mallee region has dropped significantly over the past few years, with more junior Doctors choosing to do their GP training in metropolitan areas.

“We know the evidence shows people who grow up in rural areas are more likely to live and work in rural and regional areas afterwards,” she said.

“We need to work together with our universities to attract local or rural graduates to do their training in our region to keep them here.”

Ewa’s commitment to growing the pool of GPs in regional areas and improving the quality of care available to rural and populations is reflected in her role in the Bendigo Health board.

She chairs the Community Advisory Committee and is a member of the Quality Care Council and Primary Care and Population Health Committees.

“I can bring the perspective of the community. A lot of our patients are consumers of the hospital and the hospital services. The hospital tends to deal with people on episodic admissions in times of crisis or illness. GPs are able to talk to patients when they are less stressed and can find out what things are important to them.”

Dr Piejko aims to use her position to improve the partnership between primary care and Bendigo Health.

 “We need to look at what areas of the shared-care model can be improved so patients get better care and don’t have to present to hospital. Equally when people do leave hospital the communication between medical staff and GPs, in the form of discharge summaries, can be improved to benefit the continuity of care,” she said.