IWK

Young medico Kavitesh bucks the trend

Written by IWK Bureau | Nov 18, 2010 1:38:54 AM

According to the latest workforce survey figures from the Medical Council of NZ, the proportion of Pacific doctors dropped over the past three years from 1.8 to 1.4 per cent of the workforce. Both Pacific and Maori doctors are markedly under-represented compared to their proportion of the population.

Medical Council chair John Adams believes that encouraging Pacific and Maori students into medicine and the health sciences is critical to improving healthcare outcomes for Pacific and Maori people. The good news is that Canterbury's Pegasus Health is doing something positive about it.

Pegasus Health Chair Dr Martin Seers says the organisation recognises workforce development as a key strategy in advancing Pacific health in the community, and the scholarship awards scheme is integral to this.

Four Pacific health students are celebrating their wins as this year’s recipients of Pegasus Health Pacific Health Scholarships, awarded in Christchurch recently.

A strong interest in primary health care unites the four winners and, at the end of their studies, they are all committed to sharing their knowledge in the wider Canterbury community.

Among the four is Kavitesh Deo, of Fijian-Indian descent, who is studying medicine at Auckland University. He is grateful for the scholarship, which he says, is a motivating factor for his studies.

“It’s the first scholarship I’ve received, so it’s really overwhelming. It just goes to show that there are people out there that really want you – in particular Pacific people – to succeed,’’ he says.

Kavitesh is interested in the surgery side of medicine but is keeping his options open.

“But I know I really enjoy working with children. When you see children that need help, you can’t help but feel for them and want to make them better, and I think working in my community back in Christchurch, serving people that I’ve grown up with – families, the Pacific community – will be something that I’ll be really interested in,’’ he says.