Narrogin Health Service and Wheatbelt South bid farewell to departing doctor Peter Smith

After 12 years of service to the Wheatbelt South community, Dr Peter Smith has resigned from his roles at Narrogin Health Service. The active GP obstetrician, ED senior medical officer and medical co-ordinator for the Rural Clinical School of WA Narrogin leaves behind big shoes to fill. Dr Smith is looking forward to enjoying more time with his growing family after spending the past few years travelling between his Narrogin and Perth homes, but he won’t be taking his finger off the pulse entirely. “I’m stepping back from the on-call procedural work — it won’t be a complete retirement at this point,” he said. “I’ve always had an interest in rural GP education that I’m continuing and I’m trying to expand that.” Dr Smith began practising medicine in Karratha in 2003 and also worked in Carnarvon and Esperance before he arrived in Narrogin. “The first four years or so, here I was at Earl Street Surgery,” he said. “In those days, all the GPs provided services to the hospital. There were no hospital-salaried medical officers. “Little by little we needed more support to keep the hospital going and I was the second doctor to come on full-time salaried at the hospital.” As the Wheatbelt South’s hospital hub, NHS provides care to people from Williams in the west across to Hyden in the east — an expanse of about 230km. “It’s quite a big area and emergency has got busier,” Dr Smith said. “There are a lot of locums that keep the service going — Narrogin Hospital is pivotal to the region. “We have the same locums come back and hopefully in time we’ll get back to having a strong GP number and service and there are strategies to help improve that.” One of the initiatives that Dr Smith has been heavily involved in while at NHS is the Rural Clinical School of WA. “The Rural Clinical School offers a lot of incentive and insight,” Dr Smith said. “This year we’ve had three student doctors on rotation. That’s quite awesome and some of them are choosing to come back as trainee GPs, which is really special. “We have a teaching culture and we’re increasing our capacity for education and giving a pretty unique experience in country medicine — it’s good for the program and it’s good for the town.” Dr Smith received the WA Rural Health Procedural GP/District Medical Officer of the Year Award in 2021 as acknowledgement of his work at NHS. “It’s been a great place to work,” he said. “In a country town, you get to know people and a lot of country people have a genuineness. “Everyone here works well and they’re good people — they wouldn’t be if they weren’t.”