Super Clinic site a secret | Clarence Valley News | Local News in Clarence Valley

Kevin Rudd visits Grafton during the 2007 election campaign. During that visit, he promised to build a Super Clinic in Grafton if elected.

A SITE has been selected for Grafton’s $5 million Super Clinic, but the company tasked with managing the facility is tight-lipped about its exact location.

Ochre Health director Peter Bayley said the company was in ‘advanced discussions with the owner to purchase land’ for the facility.

“The owners want it to stay confidential,” Mr Bayley said.

“I hope we can announce it (the site) by very early next year, so January. But it depends on some issues being sorted out with the council, some planning considerations have got to be worked through first. There is a fair bit of time and research involved.”

Mr Bayley said it was hoped construction on the Super Clinic, promised by Kevin Rudd during the 2007 election campaign, would begin by the middle of next year and take about 12 months to complete.

The $5 million grant from the Department of Health and Ageing will cover the purchase of land and the design and construction of the multi-disciplinary health centre.

There will be no additional federal funding once the clinic is built.

“It’s got to be an independent, viable business. There’s no additional funding for running the business of the clinic,” Mr Bayley said.

Mr Bayley began canvassing potential sites about three months ago and looked at about 15 in total before deciding on one.

The Daily Examiner can report that Grafton company Richard Van Dorp and Associates has been engaged to design and project manage the clinic’s construction.

The building will be about 900m2, large enough to house up to eight doctors, between six and 10 practice nurses and full-time and part-time allied health professionals.

Mr Bayley said Ochre Health was confident it could attract additional GPs to Grafton.

“We will be consulting widely with local doctors and health professionals about the GP Super Clinic over the next 12 months,” Mr Bayley said.

“We have talked with some local doctors, but that’s very early and it’s confidential. But I’d expect that there will be additional doctors recruited to Grafton. That’s one of the aims of the Government’s GP Super Clinic program – to help areas that have a shortage of doctors to get additional doctors.

“There will probably be a roughly equal mix (of new and existing doctors), but that’s unknown at the moment. The main point is, once the building work has commenced, that’s the time for us to recruit new doctors for Grafton.

“Grafton has something like one doctor per 1600 of the population and I think the national average is one per 1100 per population.

“What will make Grafton attractive to doctors is one, a new facility, and in that facility there will be a particular focus on health improvement, so they will be able to work in a team with other health professionals. That makes it attractive to doctors, particularly the younger doctors.

“We’ve already had two nurses express interest in coming to work in the clinic and they don’t live in Grafton at the moment.”

Mr Bayley could not confirm whether the clinic would bulk bill.

“That’s a real sensitive issue. Basically the doctors themselves will determine their billing practices,” Mr Bayley said.

“In NSW, the latest Medicare statistics show that 80 per cent of GP attendances were bulk billed. So traditionally you see young children and pensioners and the chronically ill tend to be bulk billed. We would definitely want a billing policy that covers those types of people.

“It (the clinic) can be used my any member of the public and any visitors to Grafton in the same way as you can access medical services now, so there’s no difference from that point of view (between the clinic and existing GPs).

“Grafton has a higher incidence, compared to NSW, of respiratory disease, asthma, musculoskeletal and smoking. It also has higher death rates from circulatory diseases and from cancer. The GP Super Clinic will be targeting these health priorities as well as cardiovascular disease and diabetes.”

Mr Bayley said the property must be used for its ‘designated use’ for a 20-year period after the building’s completion.