Harriet Wilde

I think that's a major, major factor.

I mean, you can see from the doctors in Timaru that the Wall Street Journal spoke to,

One child was bribed with a pony.

So I think there's definitely some lifestyle factors that are really attractive.

But also the United States health system is internationally recognized as hugely expensive, massively driven by its insurance base, quite litigious as well.

A staggering number of patients are bankrupted every year.

through health expenses.

And for many doctors, they don't want to continue practising in that kind of context.

They're looking for alternatives.

Well, I mean, there's huge benefits, both from the breadth and the depth of the knowledge that they're coming with.

They're bringing connections to universities, to international research institutions.

Our medical students and registrars are getting hugely valuable experience and building networks and connections with these doctors.

And in turn, those doctors are getting something from us and their families are too.

And what about drawbacks?

Yeah, there's a massive set of challenges, and that's not just with anyone moving countries.

With the health sector, there are layers of differences.

And one of the things that we found from our survey is that very few international medical graduates, when they're coming to Aotearoa, were getting any sort of orientation on

the New Zealand health system.

And we do have a couple of more interesting quirks that one may not experience depending on where they come from.

For example, our primary care general practice layer of the health system is largely privatised.