Forty per cent drop in GPs delivering babies
The total number of doctors delivering babies has fallen by 26% in the past five years - highlighted by an alarming 40% drop in the number of GPs carrying out deliveries over the past five years - with country areas the hardest hit by this decline in services.
The AMA says escalating medical indemnity premiums are a major contributor to the problem.
These latest statistics, contained in the report, Obstetric Medical Indemnity: The Current Situation by Melbourne obstetrician, Dr Chris Maxwell, were released today by the AMA at a national conference in Sydney of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and the National Association of Specialist Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.
AMA Federal President and keynote speaker, Dr Kerryn Phelps, said unless a solution was found to reduce current and predicted medical insurance costs, the number of doctors delivering babies would continue to decline.
"The average specialist is currently paying up to $600 per delivery just in medical insurance costs. The average Medicare Benefit for delivering babies is $639. It's just not viable.
"Insurance fees are soaring largely because of litigation costs awarded by the courts for neurologically impaired infants. The medical defence industry also reports a four-fold increase in the number of claims per obstetrician and gynaecologist over the past 10 years.
"Yet Australia is one of the safest places for a baby to be born," Dr Phelps said.
"Our perinatal mortality figures are better than most other developed countries, being behind only Japan and Spain and ahead of the UK and USA. The national perinatal mortality rate has declined by 63.3% since 1973 to a record low of 8.3 per 1000 births (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 1998).
"Australia is in the top five countries in the world for lowest maternal mortality rates - behind only Canada, Spain, Sweden and Israel," she said.
"These standards are going to fall as a result of the blowout in insurance costs. Women will be denied their choice of having obstetricians care for them during labour and there will be no other option but to line up in already overcrowded public hospitals to have your baby," Dr Phelps said.
Dr Maxwell's report Obstetric Medical Indemnity: The Current Situation, recommends a number of solutions to the crisis, including:
Adequate funding of obstetric services through full implementation of the Relative Value Study
Replacing the current adversarial system of medical litigation with a tribunal model
The capping of medical litigation awards
Government subsidisation and/or provision of medical insurance, and
A national support scheme for children with cerebral palsy.
CONTACT: John Flannery (0419) 494 761
Sarah Bucknell (0419) 440 076