A mobile medical service Street Side Medics, is coming to help Dandenong’s homeless but is facing a lack of GP volunteers.
The not-for-profit service collaborates with pre-existing charities, shelters, and services to provide crucial primary healthcare specifically for the homeless community.
It is on the lookout for medical volunteers of all types but in particular, GP volunteers in and around Greater Dandenong.
This wil be their first clinic in the south east, operating alongside Cornerstone Centre in Dandenong on Fridays. Two other services are based in Bourke Street, Melbourne and St Kilda.
Its CEO, Nicholas Brown says the GP-led service aims to operate in Dandenong by the end of November.
“By providing our clinic partnering with Cornerstone, we’re going to access a large group of people which may not otherwise have access to free primary care.
“A lot of the people we see and try to support often have health issues that are treatable, such as infections that we can provide prescription to prevent it from getting worse.”
The team are expecting to see similar health issues in Dandenong as with the other locations such as, infections mainly due to living in overcrowded dwellings, mental health issues, chronic health issues, drug and alcohol issues to name a few.
They never know what they’re dealing with until a check-up. Sometimes they have rushed a patient into surgery after suspected heart blockages.
“We saw a women recently who had infections so bad in her leg because she was housed in public housing where there was significant mould.
“The whole unit wasn’t well maintained. She was very close to developing sepsis.
“We were able to provide treatment, arrange her wound to be dressed twice a week for six-months, admit her in hospital.
“She didn’t have trust in the hospital system as she’d lost her son to the hospital but by building trust we encouraged her to get the support she needed.”
The patient ended up moving into a retirement home.
Brown says they have secured four GP volunteers but require two more to have a smooth flow of monthly rotation.
“Finding GPs in Dandenong has been challenging, not unusually challenging but obviously GPs have already been stretched, seeing a huge amount of people.
“To find people willing to put up their hand and provide more of their time outside of their work is very difficult for good reasons.
“We know, being on a Friday during the day, a lot of GPs are already working, so we need to find volunteers who are semi-retired or working part-time.
“Once we set up, we look to operate as long as we’re needed, 10am-12pm every Friday every week.
“It provides people an opportunity to know we’re there, get the support, check in and have a regular contact with a GP and medical service.”
Dandenong’s staggering homelessness statistics attracted the service to the area with 69 listed as “actively homeless” last month and 49 rough sleeping, according to the Dandenong Zero website.
The municipality was ranked the highest homelessness rate in Victoria in the 2023 census. A lack of social and affordable housing is reportedly a major contributing factor, with many residents crammed in small dwellings.
In 2023, 1719 people were without a home on any given night, the majority housed in overcrowded dwellings, boarding houses and hotels, according to a Council to Homeless Persons report.
“We wanted to push further out in the suburbs where rates of homelessness are very high but not have the same level of service,” Mr Brown says.
SSM will work alongside Cornerstone Centre, which is known for their hearty meals to vulnerable community members, as well as with partners including Orange Sky, One Voice Shower Van, The Avalon Centre Clothing and Greencross health bus.
While GPs are the “gateway” for people to access a wide variety of services, all it takes is the first step to visit a clinic to remedy treatable issues.
Street Side Medics founder Daniel Nour identified the gap in the healthcare for vulnerable people in his final year as a 24 year-old medical student living in Central London.
Despite being told not to bother with the initiative, that it won’t work, Dr Nour established SSM in August 2020 and was named the Young Australian of the Year in 2022.
With 400 volunteers across New South Wales and Victoria, SSM has proven to be life changing and crucial for the homeless community as they’re at higher risk of suffering from poor health outcomes, including higher morbidity and mortality due to a number of challenging barriers that limit their access to healthcare.
The SSM team have garnered wide coverage through 9Today, ABC News and A Current Affair.
