00:02It's down stethoscope for Victorian doctors.
00:08It's a very stressful job and pretty tough conditions, but yeah, I absolutely love it.
00:13It's such a shame that it's come to us.
00:15A four-hour stop work meeting attended by hundreds in Ballarat and in Bendigo,
00:21protesting against understaffing and work conditions in regional Victoria's hospitals.
00:26I've done many 14-hour shifts where I've had no food at all.
00:29And I know that my patients would want a doctor who's in the best frame of mind
00:33making these important decisions about their health care.
00:35What do you want?
00:36No problem!
00:37When do you want it?
00:38Now!
00:39When compared to the city, doctors say regional emergency departments are at breaking point.
00:44And patients fear for what might happen.
00:47I know you guys are trying your best and doing your best and everyone.
00:52Someone's going to make a mistake one day and it's going to be a bloody beauty.
00:56Over a three-month period this year, almost 1,400 patients across Ballarat and Bendigo
01:01stayed in the ED for longer than 24 hours.
01:04That's compared to just seven in major metropolitan hospitals.
01:08And doctors here say that needs to change.
01:10When all else goes wrong, when it's the worst day, you present to ED and you're in the hands of
01:16the public system.
01:17And at the moment I feel like all the members of the public system are being stretched to their limits.
01:22The Australian Medical Association says EBA negotiations with the state government need to be prioritised.
01:29We're into our third health minister.
01:31We're into our 12 months of negotiations and we have had no offers at all.
01:36We have a number of EBAs in the health sector that we are working on and we'll continue to back
01:42our health workers.
01:43A high stress negotiation.
01:45Thank you very much.
01:47Sp adversicular department Thacker deixar the board in the social mediaì œ.
