One in three junior doctors in Western Australia have experienced bullying, discrimination or sexual harassment at work, a new report has found.
AMA (WA) surveyed 1500 doctors in training at nine employers across the State.
An even higher number (44%) reported witnessing bullying, discrimination or sexual harassment at work, according to this year’s AMA (WA) Hospital Health Check.
Overall, 34% of doctors in training said they feared negative consequences reporting inappropriate behaviour. AMA (WA) said such damning statistics demand urgent attention.
“We remain concerned about a number of issues: ongoing workforce shortages; an apparent increase in workload, and associated fatigue and burnout issues amongst doctors in training, and the critical need for adequate measures to address these issues, and improve the attraction and retention of doctors in training within WA,” it said in a statement.
Data show international medical graduates are more likely to experience bullying, discrimination or harassment.
“We note with significant concern IMG respondents are significantly more likely to report experiencing or witnessing discrimination in particular, with IMGs being almost twice as likely as other respondents to report experiencing discrimination,” the report said.
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A total of 23% of IMG respondents reported experiencing discrimination compared to 12% of other doctors, and 29% of IMGs said they had witnessed discrimination compared to 22% of other doctors.
AMA (WA) called for improvements for doctors in training feeling able to speak up on workplace issues.
Burnout
Burnout remains a signification concern, despite an improvement seen across the majority of employers, alongside workforce capacity and training opportunities.
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“After flagging concerns the last two years on the prevalence of burnout levels overall, and specifically within Women and Newborn Health Service and Child and Adolescent Health Service, we are encouraged to see notable improvement across the majority of Employers, which is likely linked to the significant improvements in access to leave this year,” the report stated.
“However, there still needs to be further improvement across the board to ensure a healthy and safe workforce.”
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The biggest improvements in burnout rates were seen at CAHS with 62% compared to 80% in 2024, followed by Ramsay Health Care with 49% compared to 65% in 2024.
Both PathWest and WA Country Health Service have scored slightly worse than last year, with burnout rates increasing from 56% to 60% and 55% to 58%, respectively.
AMA (WA) President Dr Michael Page said the pressure doctors were under can be directly attributed to a lack of health system capacity
“Our doctors are burning out from the relentless workloads pushed onto them by perpetually over-full hospital wards and emergency departments,” he said.
“It points to the need for major capacity building by expanding our public hospitals, supporting our private hospitals and training more specialists.”
Pay errors
Pay errors also remain a consistent issue, primarily within WA Health, according to the report.
When asked how many of their last five payslips were free of errors an average of just 29% of respondents across all employers reported no mistakes.
The percentages at each employer ranged from 19% to 51%, which the AMA (WA) labelled “concerningly low”.
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“Respondents were also asked how easy it is in general to fix pay errors, with 31% of respondents overall indicating pay errors have been difficult and time-consuming to resolve (requiring greater than an hour of their time) or that they are still awaiting resolution.”
Some 16% reported spending considerable time on resolving pay issues, or resorting to assistance from the AMA (WA). Overall, 5% said pay errors had a significant impact and caused financial difficulties.
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