Rural Medical Education Australia (RuralMedEd) (RuralMedEd), formerly known as Queensland Rural Medical Education (QRME) began in 2002 when a group of rural doctors formed an organisation with a vision to ‘train to retain’ doctors in Rural Queensland. The initial training was directed at General Practitioners but grew to include medical students and junior doctors.
In 2010 RuralMedEd entered into a partnership with Griffith University which represented the successful collaboration of a large, established and well-resourced university with a flexible, responsive, not-for-profit community-based organisation that is acutely attuned to the changing needs of the rural communities it serves.
RuralMedEd’s flagship Longlook program supports one-to-two year clinical placements for medical students in rural communities. These lengthy placements provide an alternative to the model of short-term clinical rotations for city-based medical students, many of whom have not considered careers in non-metropolitan settings. The Longlook program addresses medical workforce shortages in rural communities through the achievement of a rural retention rate of 80% for Longlook students who have trained in a rural community for two years.