Dr Jaime Baquiran was inspired to become a GP after joining a medical mission to the Philippines with a group of GPs. Dr Baquiran, from myhealth Macarthur Square, says the experience changed him and he’s never looked back.
How long have you been a GP and how long have you been practising in the Campbelltown LGA?
I’ve been a GP since 2017 and have practised in Campbelltown at myhealth Macarthur Square since 2020.
When/why did you decide you wanted to become a GP?
In 2015 I was working in critical care in a hospital.
I decided to become a GP after going on a medical mission with the Philippine Australian Medical Association in 2016.
We travelled to a place called La Union and went out into the region in groups. There was a surgical group and a GP group. It was an area where they don’t have any real medical services so doctors travel in once every couple of months or once a year to do what they can in a couple of days. Basically, you go there, the local council advertises there will be a doctor’s clinic which will run for a couple of days and the whole town lines up with all their ailments for medical care.
I spent time with the GPs during that trip, that changed me, and I’ve never looked back.
What do you love most about being a GP/what part of the job gives you the most satisfaction?
Two things.
One is working with other GPs. You get such a broad, eclectic mix of doctors coming from all walks of life in general practice. Doctors from surgery, medical and psychiatric backgrounds. So, you get this really interesting mix of skills and expertise. It’s nice for the community to be able to access all those different perspectives on what healthcare is.
And the second is being able to get to know my patients.
It’s not just about knowing them when they’re unwell but knowing them when they’re well. You learn about how they function within their family, within their workplace, within the community. You get a full picture of a person rather than just knowing about whatever acute illness they’ve come in with like you do in a hospital setting.
What is the most important thing you/your practice contributes to this community?
The health system is so complex.
If you take COVID as an example. The messaging has been so conflicting and so dynamic, changing all the time. We’re an accessible interface for the community to help them navigate the health system and the health messaging.
It can take a long time to get in to see a specialist, or to ask a specialist a question, but we’re always here.
With COVID, common questions we get are ‘can I take an antiviral? do I need another vaccination?’. Just being here, readily accessible for the community if there’s anything our patients need, is the most important thing.
What do you like to do in your spare time?
I help my wife look after the babies. We’ve got a two-year-old and a four-month-old.
I used to be in a band with some fellow medical students, and I still play guitar and study music on the side.
The rest of my time I spend learning to write computer programs. My interest is in the programming language Python and specifically trying to use that to help me do my job as a GP better.
Is there anything else you’d like to let your fellow primary carers know about you?
I’m a big believer in collaboration. If there’s one thing we don’t do enough of, it’s collaborating because GPs are so busy all the time. Often, you’ll have patients who go to different practices and some patients will have two or three different GPs. I’m always open to communication and a phone call from colleagues to collaborate on caring for our patients.
What do you love most about Campbelltown?
There’s so much interesting medicine, so much diversity of medical presentations and chronic conditions. It’s really interesting.
What advice do you give your patients about maintaining good health?
I see a lot of stress, a lot of people that are overworked and a lot of mental health and physical health conditions as a flow on effect of those things.
I also see a lot of stress due to the uncertainty of COVID. Things like people having to change careers or they’ve lost their jobs or their marriages have broken down, and there are patients with symptoms of long COVID and I see the mental health effects of that.
If I was to boil it down, I’d say a lot of ill health and mental health comes from difficulty managing stress and not maintaining family and social connections. Whenever I give any medical advice, I always try to frame it within that context.
As an example, it’s one thing to tell a person to eat healthier as part of the Australian dietary guidelines and it’s another thing to tell them to sit down and try and have as many meals as you can with your family.