Computer generated transcript

Warning!
The following transcript was generated automatically from the content and has not been checked or corrected manually.

If you can see the slides, please. Um Guys, can you just message if you can see the um first slide, please? Um Not awesome. Ok, so this is Doctor Perry. She's currently doing her fy three in Australia and she's here to tell you guys a little bit about that. Uh I'll just leave it over to you. Yeah, so yeah, as as we said, I'm uh currently in Australia doing my f three year over here. Um So this is just kind of a bit of a talk about the process, my personal experience of it. Um And hopefully answer a few questions that you might have. Um Obviously, you kind of need to stress that this is just my experience. It's not a um complete overview. It's just what I found when I was looking at moving out here and, and obviously things might change over the next few years. I know you're all still at uni so everything changes year on year. But yeah, so just to start with a bit about me, um I went to Leicester Uni graduated in 2021 with my medical degree and an Indicator masters in research. I did my foundation, my foundation training at James Cook in Middlesbrough in F one, I did colorectal surgery and acute medicine F two. I did critical care and GP. Um, and then got to the end of that, wasn't really sure what I wanted to do, um, was kind of thinking about anesthetics. So put in an application for that. Um And then last January decided I didn't want to sit at the M SRA exam, um because it just felt like a lot of pressure when I was already working quite hard, felt great at the time by February, I kind of started to panic and think, what am I actually going to do next year? So I started to think about Australia. I had a friend who was out here already and he was really, really loving it. And so I started talking to him, talking about his experience of it and decided that I would try and move out kind of to this sort of area. So March, I started looking at and applying for jobs, applied for quite a few. Um just to give myself some options by April. I had some interviews, got some job offers, paperwork and application side of things took a long time. And so I would say kind of make sure you factor that in. You can be as on top of it as you want with paperwork, but you still have to just wait for things to come back and then had to do a medical check, wait for my visa and then came out here in August. So there were a few reasons for choosing Australia primarily wasn't really ready to go into training. As I said, I put in an aesthetics application, but I wasn't really sure that that was what I wanted to do. I felt like I was kind of applying something for the sake of it. Um I don't think I need to go into kind of all of the problems with the NHS, but it is hard work and I don't think you realize how bad parts of it are until you're out of it. Um It's a good chance to travel. I think you start preparing for medical school when you're about 1516 and it's just obstacle after obstacle. Um since then and you get through medical school interviews and you start medical school and then you feel like you've gotta get on the foundation and get stuck on the conveyer belt. So kind of a chance to take a break from all of that. See the world a bit. Um The weather is really great out here and just a bit of a different lifestyle as well. A bit more balanced, a bit more focused on enjoying your time off and not being so stressed about bulking out your portfolio for your next round of applications. And because everyone was talking about it, it seems to be the big thing and I thought this is my one chance to do it. So why not give it a go? Um So obviously the first step is looking for jobs. There's a few different ways you can do that. Um You can apply directly to the hospitals. Um I've heard I haven't seen the list directly, but I've heard that somewhere circulating on the internet, there's a big list of all the hospitals in Australia and all of the contact details for the directors of the department. So you could, if you know that you want to be in one specific hospital, you could just um email the director ask if they've got any jobs going and um I know of people who have done that and it's worked out for them. So that's always an option. Um But you know what, we've got to consider that they're not always looking for people. And if you're applying outside of a job cycle that might get ignored for 6 to 9 months, so you are kind of just waiting around for them. Um State recruitment cycles. So they publish jobs on their like kind of a government website type thing. That's how I got my, the job that I'm at. Um just looking at the government website waiting for jobs to come up. Um Again, I knew that I wanted to be in this sort of area. So I was kind of focused on um the recruitment cycles for that. Um You can do it via an agency. I don't know of many people who have done that, but I think it's a fairly straightforward process. You register with an Australian medical kind of local agency. You don't do it as a local job, but with those agencies, you can link you up with hospitals. I guess the benefits of that is if you talk to an agent and you say that you want certain factors in your hospital, you want to be close to the beach or you want to be um at a major tertiary center or things like that, if you have specific things that you're looking for with your job and they're able to give you a bit more information, obviously, you might not know that much about the different hospitals in Australia, um, online job boards. Um So just kind of classic job websites, I think like, um linkedin and things like that or, um, there's a lot of adverts in the BMJ now because Australian hospitals know that so many British doctors want to come over. So they're advertising to us as well. So kind of just keeping an eye out for adverts that come to you, um, the jobs on offer. Um, I think I was just saying that most commonly people apply to the emergency department just because it's kind of a fairly easy job to slot into. Um, you know, you can slot in at any time. They're always taking on new staff, not just at the start of their, um, like work here. Um So any time that suits you to come out, it kind of works out. Um And it's just a bit of everything, it means you don't have to choose one area and some people do rotational medical jobs as well. So kind of ward based jobs a bit more similar to the stuff that you've been doing in F one and F two. But there's options and it's kind of up to you what you prefer. You do have to work for at least a year in a fixed contract before you can lo come. So this first year in terms of registration is kind of the equivalent to an F one year where you're like partially registered um with supervision. And then once you've done your first year, you'll have like a meeting with your supervisor at your hospital, you fill in some forms and then you'll be granted general registration. And then at that point, you've got a bit more flexibility. You can apply for a few more different types of jobs with a bit less supervision. Um And you can locum without kind of having the same supervisor um overseeing your work. Um This is just kind of a map of Australia to just show you like it's a very big place, there's lots of different areas that you can apply to. Um and it's worth bearing in mind that um Australia works off a state based system um most of most aspects. Um And so each state has its own healthcare system. Um That's not to say that if you're from Queensland, you can't get some health care in New South Wales, like that's all fine. But as a doctor, you're employed by New South Wales Health or Queensland Health. Um And so that will affect your contract a bit and it will affect um kind of your pay scales and ease of working in other areas. So the job roles that you apply for, um you can apply to be a resident or a registrar. I think most people who come out apply to be a resident. Um It's kind of the same as being an F two. So anyone in their like second year out of medical school, you do sometimes progress to being a senior or resident medical officer or a um principal house officer and that's kind of you're still a resident, but just a bit more of a senior level. Um or some people do apply for registrar jobs. I think that's probably a bit more pressure, you know, for one, you're coming out here for maybe a bit of a change of pace, but for two, you're coming out to a completely new system. Um So you don't want to be taking on too much responsibility too soon. But if it's something that you feel like you're ready for, especially if you've maybe done a few extra years in the UK before coming out. If you don't come out straight for three, if you do your F three in the UK and then come out for four or five, you might be ready to take on a bit more responsibility. It's not quite the same as being a registrar in the UK, in the UK. A registrar. You've been out of medical school for about five years. Whereas here it's kind of your third or more year out of medical school. And so it's more, more responsibility compared to a resident, but slightly less responsibility compared to a registrar in the UK. Um, you may still be left in charge overnight, but you'll always have a consultant on the other end of the phone. Um Again, obviously, that's something you can look into more closer to the time, but it's kind of worth working out what jobs you're applying for in the first place. Um And accredited versus unaccredited just means there's a bit more scope in Australia for applying to registrar training, not formally on a training pathway. And again, that's kind of probably a bit more detail than you need at this stage. But it's just to say that if you come over as a resident, there are um a few more opportunities to progress on to becoming a registrar after you've been out here. Um Pay is obviously one of those things that gets talked about a lot. It's variable, but in general, it's about a 30% pay rise compared to the UK and just you pay salary and obviously beyond that, you get out of hours enhancements at pay on Sundays and for evenings and for nights and things like that, um, you do get paid differently in each state. So, um, if you're coming straight out of F two, you get the best pay in the northern territory. But you also have to bear in mind that with the enhancements, it all works out a bit differently and I wouldn't apply to just for the higher pay, but it is definitely worth bearing in mind. Um A lot of hospitals will now also offer some relocation costs, um kind of payment towards your flights or your visa. Um You can also, once you're out here apply for salary packaging and that's just a proportion of your salary that you get tax free because you're working in a government job. It's a lot easier here to claim over time. And again, that's not necessarily true for every hospital, but at my hospital, at least, you know, last week I stayed an hour late one evening and my next paycheck, I'll get that extra hour back in pay. Whereas in the UK, I don't think it has ever happened. You get paid every fortnight instead of every month. So you've just kind of got a bit more of a steady stream of money coming in as well. So that's also a bonus. Um Tax, you still pay it, even though you're not uh Australian citizen and that comes out that's about 20% of your pay and you also get superannuation, which as far as I understand is kind of similar to a pension fund. Um So you can claim that back at once, you, once you leave your job. Um, but that's just another bit that comes out of your salary. Um So you don't receive it every two weeks, you'll receive it later on down the line. So once I applied for my jobs, I've kind of considered all of that applied for some jobs. I had my interview, it was just over zoom so nice and easy. They're aware that they're, that you're applying from the UK and they'll try and give you the first interview in the morning or the last interview at night. I know that for my interview, the director of the department came in at 7 a.m. so that it was a reasonable time for me and it worked for him as well. So they are considerate with things like that. And I think that kind of, you know, the fact that they did that for me for my first interview kind of showed that they were going to be considerate the whole way through. It was a really informal chat, nice and easy. We went through a clinical scenario and then they kind of asked me why I wanted to move to Australia. Um And that was basically it it was probably took about half an hour and they offered me the job. Um, straight away, I did a couple of interviews and they all kind of followed the same format. Um, again, I needed three interviews so I can't speak for every hospital in the whole of Australia. But they all seem to be, you know, they know that they want to recruit British doctors. They know the kind of standard that British doctors are trained to, they know that we fit in well, in their departments. They're happy for us to come. As long as you can make it through a 20 minute chat without completely embarrassing yourself. You're pretty much guaranteed a job as far as I've heard from everyone else. Um, you've got to be eligible to work in Australia. Um, they've got a few different pathways of how you can register that. I think most of you should be eligible by the competent authority pathway. Um, so you have to have registered with a GMC. You have to have graduated from a UK medical school and you have to have completed F one, which I guess most or all of you will be doing. Um, so that is just to say that you can't go to Australia straight out of medical school. But, um, as long as you do that first year, it's fairly easy to get through it and you don't have to sit any further exams or anything like that. Paperwork. Is the tough part. There's a lot to it and it costs a lot of money. So you do have to be prepared for that. So you have to register with the Australian Medical Council. You get your documents notarized, you get some of them notarized online, you have to get some of them notarized in real life. That cost is variable depending on the notary you find, but tends to be fairly expensive. You get a letter of good standing from the GMC just to say that you've worked under the GMC and you haven't had any big complaints against you or anything like that. You have to get an international criminal history check. And basically, if you do have a criminal history, you're probably not going to be allowed into Australia. You get your provisional registration, this is a load of forms and it costs you 500 lbs at the end. And that's all of your um details about where you've worked, why you've studied things like that. You have to then get another police check. This one is for your visa, write a letter of intent. So this is just a letter to support your visa application to explain why you want to come to the country. And to also, I think is supposed to clarify that you are going to leave the country when your visa's up. Obviously, for a lot of us that might not apply, you might end up staying for longer. You might apply for further visas. But I think you can have to go in under the pretense that you're going for your two year visa and then you're going to leave. And if you change your mind later down the line, that's fine. But for the initial visa, you have to kind of explain that you're already there for two years or however long your visa might be. And then you apply for your visa and this should be sponsored by your hospital. So they will kind of support your visa. They'll write a letter to the government and explain that you need to come to the visa to work from that hospital, but you still have to pay 750 lbs. And then you also have to go for a health check where they do an X ray and kind of just a couple of bloods to make sure that you're not going to go to Australia. And in fact, everyone with TB will be a massive burden on their healthcare system. So all of that costs the best part of 2000 lbs. Um So you do need to be prepared for that once I got here, my department. So I work in the emergency department. I work in Northern New South Wales. So kind of just on the border between New South Wales and Queensland and it's a really relaxed department whenever particularly rushed off our feet. I see about six or 10 patients a day and that's a 10 hour shift. That's nice and relaxed. Some days, I'll see more, some days, I'll see less. And on average patients wait about 30 minutes to be seen by a doctor, which is obviously unheard of in the NHS. So when you see them, they're a lot more cheerful, they're a lot less frustrated. It makes the whole job easier and you can see a patient, get your x rays, get your CT scans, everything and you still might send them home within four hours. So the department's really nice. This is a bit of an anomaly, you know, other departments, especially ones in the big cities in Sydney or further up in Queensland, they do have much bigger waiting times. My department is a bit of a weird one that seems to just run quite smoothly, but it is nice and it's something that I really enjoy and I guess that's something you should consider as well. The department that you're actually going to work in and what you want to be getting out of it. You know, if you want to be seeing major trauma, then get yourself to a big hospital. But if you're coming for a bit more of a relaxed break from NHS training, then look at hospitals like mine where it's, um, you get to enjoy yourself a bit more. We do see the same pathologies as in the UK, you know, it's not completely different, see the same stuff the same basic things come in time and time again. Um, your knowledge from the UK carries over fairly well here. Some of the medications are slightly different and some of the doses are slightly different, but the pathology is the same. Um, and the principles are all the same. You do see a few different things over here. You know, I've seen snake bites. We get a lot of people who have got surfboard injuries or oyster cuts and there's slightly different things here. But again, most hospitals have a lot of UK graduates and they're used to kind of teaching us the way things work with these things that we haven't seen before. Um, and again, it probably depends on the department you're in, but there's just a lot more support and a lot more encouragement for you to learn things and get to do new things. Um, you get to do a lot more procedures, you get to get involved a lot more. They're a lot happier to supervise and teaching you, um, procedures as well. Um, so, yeah, it's a lot more hands on than I was when I did my emergency medicine job in the UK. Um, I also get to go to resource schools. You get, um, they assign a research team each day and one of the residents is always on the research team. So you get to go in, you get to be a part of that team. You get to, um, help assess and run the research call. Um, so, yeah, it's just, again, I can't speak for every department, but in my department, at least it's just a lot more supportive and I feel like I learn a lot more than I ever did in the UK, which is especially nice at this time. I'm not learning for anything in particular. I'm not studying for exams. I'm just learning to be a better doctor. Um, that's quite nice. And as well, my department and most departments that, you know, of my friends who are over here there seems to be about 50% British graduates in a lot of the major departments in the emergency departments in Australia. So you settle in, well, you've got a very good support network. A lot of people who have moved over here in the same situation as you have, who are looking to kind of make new friends and travel and enjoy being in Australia. So, yeah, it's really nice in terms of settling in. Um, it depends a lot on the hospital and my hospital paid for me to get, have two weeks in a motel. It wasn't the nicest, but it was just next to the hospital. It meant that I didn't have to stress about accommodation and it gives you a bit of time to get up on your feet. If you start at the same time as a lot of other new doctors start, then that can be quite sociable as well. Um, yeah, it just gives you a bit of time to get used to things before you have to start panicking. Um, the jet lag was bad that made settling in really difficult. Um, I think, especially for me because I was in that motel and I arrived at a time when not other, no other doctors had started. So I was in that motel on my own. So kind of trying to get accustomed to the new time zone did take a while, but I guess you get over it in the end. Um Things like getting a car, it depends on where you're working. You know, if you're in Sydney, then you won't need one. But if you're up on the Gold Coast where I am, everyone gets around by car. So that's something that I didn't really factor in and one for an added cost, but two buying a car in a rush is quite difficult. Um But once I got the car at and I can move to some accommodation a little bit further out. So I guess that's something to be prepared for working out, how you're gonna get around and how you're gonna get the flexibility. Um Accommodation again will vary a lot depending on where you are. But I think the rental situation in Australia is quite similar to a lot of places in the UK where it's all very fast. So you're almost worth waiting until you get out to Australia finding somewhere that wants you here and you can look around places and if you find somewhere online and you like it, you'll probably be moved in in a week or two's time. It all moves very, very fast. Um And then obviously suffering into work is kind of what I came out to do. Um Suffering into a new department does take a bit of time, but everyone was super friendly. I was working within five days of landing in Australia. And I'd say after about a week, I felt like I knew the place, I felt like I knew how things run. I was quite happy to crack on, on my own. Um Yeah, and then outside of medicine as well. So I work six days, I work eight days a fortnight. So I have six days off. Um plus an extra day every month just because of the way that my rotor works. Um And the Rotas are fairly flexible, I guess again, it depends on the department you're in. But if I email in advance and I say for the fortnight beginning the first of April, I would like these to be my six days off. As long as I give them enough notice, they'll make that work. Um You get annual leave as well. That's very variable depending on where you are. But I think it's about five weeks, annual leave a year, you kind of accrue it as you go through. So you can't take all your annual leave in the first week. Um, but there seems to be plenty of leave. Um, yeah. Um, and it's just, you know, making the most of your time off. So, in terms of what I do outside of the hospital, it's quite nice. You're in a group of self selecting colleagues, as I've said, there's a lot of other British doctors out here and they're all kind of come out coming out with the same mindset of wanting to enjoy their time, wanting to travel. Um kind of needing that same support network. You know, everyone's away from their families. So you become each other's friends and family and it's really nice, really supportive and it means that you've just got people to explore with. Um It depends whereabouts in Australia you are, but there's beaches, there's countrysides, um and all the things you can do there. And if you do have a bit of time off, you can travel around Australia, you can go to New Zealand, Singapore Bali, all these places that are on this side of the world that are, they still do take a while to get to, you know, Australia is massive. It still takes me on the eastern coast. It still takes me about four hours to fly to New Zealand, but that's only four hours compared to if I was coming from the UK 24 hours. So kind of, you know, while you're over here, you may as well see as much of it as you can. And then once you get to the end of your year, there's loads of options. You can extend your contract, you can lo and travel, see a bit more of Australia, see different parts of Australia or you can go into training, which again, there are plenty of options for. Um and you know, it doesn't have to be that you finish your year and you make your final decision as to whether you're staying or going stay for a couple of years and then head back or you can a lot of people come out for a year, go back, do a bit of training and then come back to Australia. Um It's f flexible kind of you decide what suits you and go from there. Um So yeah, I think that's the end of my talk. Um That's my email address or my phone number if you wanna message me um with any questions. And yeah, does anyone have any questions if they want to send them in the chat? Awesome. Thank you very much. Um Does anyone have any questions? Um So in terms of getting a training post and I couldn't honestly say, I think it depends on what you want to do. Um So certain ones are a lot harder. Um GPI know a few of my friends have gone into GP and they're enjoying it and you have to do a few more um rotations to like kind of have your, you have to have a certain amount of medical training, a certain amount of surgical or pediatric training. Um But there are options um emergency medicine as well. It's quite easy to get some training for as well. Um And that kind of goes back to what I was saying about accredited and unaccredited training. Um It's difficult to summarize that all straight away, but there are options to go into training basically. Um, in terms of recommending it compared to the N HSI, think it depends on what you want really. Um, I'm enjoying it. I prefer it to the NHS right now. I think I will go back to the NHS in the long term. Um, but I think there's so much to kind of weigh up in terms of being close to your family, kind of being in a system that you might find it easy to progress in. You might be, it might be easier to progress in the NHS, depending on what you want to do. Um, so, yeah, I don't think I could really say it's better or worse. Um, spiders. I don't see very many where I am. Um, I see a lot of lizards and other, you know, uh, other kind of wildlife. I don't see many spiders. But again, I think that depends on where you are. Um, in terms of people staying for training. I think that's again, very variable of the people that I've been working with, most of them are heading back to the UK for specialty training. But again, I think that's as much to do with kind of family and being close to home as it is with the healthcare system itself. Um, and it kind of depends on what people want in the long run. I guess it's worth mentioning that in my emergency department, about 50% of the registrars and consultants are from the UK. So they've obviously come out here uh when they were like kind of POSTOP too and they've stayed for 5, 10 years. So, you know, people do stay, people do go. Um, for me, I only really considered Australia and I briefly thought about New Zealand, but just from what I heard, Australia kind of had a bit more of that uh, lifestyle that I was looking for. And as I mentioned, I had a friend who was out here. So that's why I thought of Australia. But I know a lot of people do consider New Zealand and Canada. So I guess, you know, if that's something you're interested in then worth doing a bit more research. Um, in terms of applying for specialties, I'm not really sure what I want to do long term yet. I think my plan is to stay out here to work in the emergency department for a bit longer, maybe apply for emergency medicine training. But again, I still haven't quite figured out how long I want to stay in the UK, how long I want to stay in Australia for when I want to head back to the UK. So, um it's definitely a thought and it's an option. I know a few of my colleagues from last year have started emergency medicine training. Um So it's, you know, it's an easy enough thing to do, but I just kind of obviously can't say whether it's something that I'm gonna do. Um There's a lot of questions, not sure if we got through all of them. Um Living costs, it's hard to break it down the living cost, but in terms of my salary, so I came out here by the time I'd spent all of my money on like coming out here and booking my flights and everything. I came out here with not very much money at all. I didn't really have any savings left and I've been out here for six months and I've got a good amount of savings and I don't really stick to any strict budget. So salary is plenty to get by on and it matches the living cost. Rent out here is quite expensive, but your salary will cover it. Um And you will still, as long as you're not spending silly amounts of money on things, you should have enough to still go traveling and see Australia while you're out here. Um in terms of the size, if you want them just send me an email, um, I can email them out to you. I don't know if we're able to distribute them in any other way. Ok. We'll come back to that. Um, better to go after F one, F two. Most. Everyone that I know has gone after F two. just because then at least you've completed foundation training and you've got options to go back to the UK. Um, if you don't complete foundation training within your set time, then you're a bit stuck. So I would definitely recommend finishing ft but if you're certain that you want to go to Australia and stay there forever, then I mean, I guess you could go after F one. Um I can't comment for matching into competitive fields like dermatology. Um From what I've heard, it is more difficult. I think Australia, Australian training systems prefer Australian graduates and then kind of IM GS do get selected a bit lower down. So, yeah, I think it is more difficult to get into dermatology, but that's just, that's what I've heard. I don't, haven't looked into it personally. Um So yeah, you probably would be disadvantaged. But then I guess it's one of those things that if you build your CV up enough and if you make this application competitive enough, there are always people who have managed to do it. So it's an option. Um Racism in Australia is an interesting question. Um I had heard, I had heard the same. I'd heard that there was a lot more, um, I guess there's a lot more throwaway comments, I think in terms of political correctness. Australia is a few years behind the UK. Um, in my personal experience I haven't had anyone being kind of maliciously racist to me, I think, kind of just a bit more ignorant and kind of comments but nothing bad. Nothing that is really rattled me or nothing that I can even really think about right now. Um, but I guess again that's just my personal experience. I can't speak for everyone but, you know, I'm here, I've got uh plenty of um, Asian and black friends who have all kind of poked enough or enjoying it and uh planning on staying long term. So, yeah, again, I guess it depends on where you are. I think the bigger cities are more multicultural and the rural areas are a little bit more backwards in their beliefs. But yeah, it's fine. I've had no issues personally. Um, in terms of stuff to do and foundation training to make you a better candidate. Not really. I think they're all fairly happy to take you. Um, I had done an emergency medicine job so I guess that was helpful but I know a lot of people who hadn't and they still got jobs. Um, I think it's just, you know, making sure that you get through foundation training without any issues getting some good references. Um, yeah. Um again, I can't really comment on specialty training. I haven't applied for specialty training. I know one girl who was doing emergency medicine with me, she's now um doing a registrar job for pediatrics, but she's not doing a training post. Um I can't really say um boosting CV, I've just mentioned and my email I just, I'll um type it in the chart. Really? I can't type it in the chart. Um It's G AU R IK A P 97 at gmail.com. Yeah. Is that right? Yeah, thanks. Yeah. Um ok. Um thanks. I think it um um I think that's um most of the questions. If you guys have any other questions, please, could you put them on the beam of pigeon hole? And um we will get them to Doctor Perry as soon as possible. This session has been recorded, it is on metal. So everything that goes on here is recorded. Um Thank you very much for joining. Thanks.