Federal Member for Hume Angus Taylor has announced Federal funding to expand doctor training facilities at the Picton Family Medical Centre.

The centre will receive a grant of $254,284 under the Government’s $52.5 million Rural and Regional Teaching Infrastructure Grants (RRTIG) initiative, announced in last year’s budget.

The funding will allow the practice to extend its premises and build five additional consultation rooms, a larger treatment room, and a conference room for teaching.

Mr Taylor said the infrastructure initiative was helping already established medical practices meet some of the challenges in training up the medical workforce.

“The Picton Family Medical Centre will now be able to make practical changes by extending its rooms to help take on more trainee doctors and medical students, which will bring more doctors into the community,” he said.

Mr Taylor met recently with practitioner Dr Anna Pham and practice manager Brooke Morgan to hear how the funding will be spent.

“This will allow our practice to accommodate three additional registrars, in their final stages of general practice medicine training and two additional medical students. We are delighted with the government infrastructure support and plan to start work on the expansion before the end of the year,” Dr Pham said.

Mr Taylor said the infrastructure grants were part of a suite of measures to improve medical care in rural and regional areas.

“The Federal Government is taking a big-picture, long-term approach when it comes to meeting the growing health care needs of regional communities,” Mr Taylor said.

Caption: Federal Member for Hume Angus Taylor shares the good news of $254,000 in Federal funding to expand the Picton Family Medical Centre with practitioner Dr Anna Pham and practice manager Brooke Morgan.