Doctors' health: can we do better under national registration?

The move to national registration of doctors presents both threats and opportunities for the manner in which doctors seek health care and for providing assistance to doctors who may be impaired by illness. The most striking threat is the regressive nature of the provisions for mandatory reporting of ill doctors. The new system should be grasped as an opportunity to achieve national agreement on resourcing adequate services to help distressed doctors and to foster education and research into the health of doctors and medical students. The new system also provides opportunities to explore ways of encouraging doctors to improve their poor record of not attending to their own health, such as denying Medicare rebates for most doctors who self-refer.