The NRHN and the National Rural Health Alliance are pleased to publish some of the stories from the JFSS, to emphasise its value. Some of the quotations were collected by the NRHN and sent with an accompanying letter to Minister Dr Michael Wooldridge in December 2000. The JFSS Project Team has received additional comments, which have also been included. The JFSS is a long- term strategy that aims to increase the number of doctors in rural and remote communities. It has strong support from the Minister for Health and Aged Care, Dr Michael Wooldridge.
Medical students spend two weeks a year for four consecutive years in a country community.
While there they are supervised by a GP mentor and spend time with as many other parts of the local health service as possible, and also get to know the local community. The GP mentor acts as a role model for the scholarship holder and introduces them to country medical practice, the local health system and health workers in the region. For the first three years the JFSS was run independently by the ten Medical Schools then in existence. The NRHA won that tender and officially took over as National Management Agency in May 2000. Among other things, the new guidelines from the Commonwealth fixed the amount of financial support distributed to the various parties.