{"id":265287,"date":"2025-11-05T23:27:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-05T23:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/265287\/"},"modified":"2025-11-05T23:27:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-05T23:27:10","slug":"doctor-heard-about-600k-julia-creek-job-from-truck-driving-brother-not-from-viral-campaign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/265287\/","title":{"rendered":"Doctor heard about $600k Julia Creek job from truck-driving brother, not from viral campaign"},"content":{"rendered":"

When the remote Queensland town of Julia Creek started searching for a permanent doctor, the job’s $600,000 pay packet went viral.<\/p>\n

The local health service received 95 applications from across the globe for the position, which involves looking after the town’s 550 people.<\/p>\n

But the doctor who won the job was an Australian rural generalist who says she found out about the position over a beer with her brother on a cattle property near Mudgee, in the New South Wales Central West.<\/p>\n

“I actually had not seen the viral campaign,” Pip Bunting said.<\/p>\n

“We were having a beer one afternoon out the front and I said, ‘Oh, I’m really looking for a new challenge now.’<\/p>\n

“And my brother said, ‘What about Julia Creek?'”<\/p>\n

Dr Bunting’s brother used to drive road trains across the Top End and he would stop in Julia Creek for his COVID tests. He heard about the job on ABC Radio.<\/p>\n

“That’s how I found out about it, and then of course from there I’d heard all this stuff that was going on in the background with the viral campaign,” she said.<\/p>\n

“But honestly, it was a discussion with him, not the campaign itself.”<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/p>\n

Pip Bunting’s job is now looking after the town’s 550 people. (Supplied: Warren Butterworth)<\/p>\n

Now, two months into the job, Dr Bunting is enjoying her new home.<\/p>\n

“This is a fantastic little community,” she said.<\/p>\n

“I’ve called it a bit of a utopia to my friends. There’s so much to do out here.”<\/p>\n

‘Confident we’ve made the right choice’<\/p>\n

North West Hospital and Health Service chief executive Sean Birgan said applicants were shortlisted to eight Australian rural generalist doctors.<\/p>\n

The previous doctor, Adam Louws, held the position for two years before moving back to Brisbane<\/a> with his family.<\/p>\n

The GP position operates out of the Julia Creek Multipurpose Health Service, which includes an emergency department, general practice and aged care support.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

The job’s incentives are double what is offered to GPs in most Australian cities. (Supplied: Queensland Health)<\/p>\n

“These roles require a huge responsibility for a single town doctor,” Mr Birgan said.<\/p>\n

“The salary and entitlements for this position were in line with the entitlements of any doctor, working with the suitable qualifications, in a remote location in Queensland.”<\/p>\n

Mr Birgan said Dr Bunting was selected for her experience as a rural generalist, as well as emergency medicine.<\/p>\n

“We’re very confident we’ve made the right choice,” he said.<\/p>\n

‘It’s a real privilege’<\/p>\n

Dr Bunting said she took the job because it was an opportunity to be the sole doctor in a community, practising “true rural generalist” medicine.<\/p>\n

“You get to use all your skills. You’re dealing with patients that have babies, right through to aged care and everything in between,” she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“It’s a real privilege to be invited into people’s lives as doctors, sometimes at the best times of their life, sometimes at the worst.”<\/p>\n

Loading…<\/p>\n

Dr Bunting said there was “no typical average day”, but the support of her colleagues and the community made things manageable.<\/p>\n

“Even on our crazy busy days, it has been good because we’ve got a really good team,” she said.<\/p>\n

Rural generalists recognised as specialists<\/p>\n

In September, the Medical Board of Australia and the federal government endorsed and approved rural medicine becoming a field of speciality practice.<\/p>\n

Minister for Health and Ageing Mark Butler said recognition of rural generalist medicine established a national standard, encouraging more doctors to choose a rural generalist career.<\/p>\n

\"a<\/p>\n

A “magic” Julia Creek sunset in outback Queensland.\u00a0 (Supplied: Tourism Queensland)<\/p>\n

Dr Bunting said the development of medical rural schools was a step in the right direction, but she wanted to see more rural kids become rural doctors.<\/p>\n

“I think certainly coming from a rural background, we should try really hard to recruit kids that have grown up in that rural environment and appreciate how special that can be,” she said.<\/p>\n

“The financial incentives help, but there’s something innate about being someone that’s come from that background.”<\/p>\n

In the meantime, Dr Bunting plans on making Julia Creek home.<\/p>\n

“I’m here for a while, absolutely,” she said.<\/p>\n

“What a great place to work when every day ends with a magic Julia Creek sunset.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When the remote Queensland town of Julia Creek started searching for a permanent doctor, the job’s $600,000 pay…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":265288,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[24243,43,155162,155165,44,155164,155163,155166,119070,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-265287","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-doctor","tag-headlines","tag-julia-creek","tag-medical-board-of-australia","tag-news","tag-north-west-hospital-and-health-service","tag-pip-bunting","tag-remote-gp","tag-rural-generalist-medicine","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=265287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}