WORKING IN PSYCHIATRY IN NEW ZEALAND: EXPERIENCES OF INTERNATIONAL (NON-NEW ZEALAND) MEDICAL GRADUATES

On the 11th of February 2016, the Health Secretary in the United Kingdom (UK) Jeremy Hunt announced his plan to impose the Junior Doctor Contract despite thousands of healthcare professionals storming the streets of Westminster in defiant protest. A leading member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists Psychiatric Trainee Committee described the Junior Doctor Contract as 'poisonous', exclaiming that it would be a 'disaster for mental health' and that it would 'disincentivize doctors to work in an already desperately under-resourced specialty'. The number of doctors who applied for documentation to work abroad surged by over 1000 per cent on the same day that the Health Secretary made the Junior Doctor Contract announcement. Not surprisingly, Jeremy Hunt was accused of acting as 'a recruiting agent' for hospitals in Australasia. This paper provides background information about working conditions for Junior Doctors in the National Health Service in the UK and the anticipated effects that the Junior Doctor Contract will have on their morale, well-being and occupational functioning. Our paper then provides a brief overview of mental health services in New Zealand with a focus on a Maori mental health service provider in the North Island. We conclude our paper by offering insights from International Medical Graduates from the UK and from South Africa working as a Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists Psychiatric Registrar and Consultants in Waikato District Health Board (DHB) in Hamilton, New Zealand, respectively.