Junior doctors are being given an opportunity to gain specialist skills without having to head to the city.
Monash School of Rural Health graduate doctors can now complete their post-graduate psychiatry training in Mildura as part of a program that could be expanded to include more specialties.
The five-year psychiatry course is the first formally-accredited specialist training program in the region.
New deputy director of the North West Victorian Regional Training Hub, Associate Professor Hieu Pham, said basing advanced programs in regional areas would help address a doctor shortage.
Dr Pham said medical graduates wanted to continue their studies in regional areas but more work was needed to gain accreditation from the various practitioner colleges before the training would be available.
"In order to become a medical specialist in any field, you must be trained formally by the various college-accredited programs."
The school is in the early stages of gaining accreditation to provide specialist programs in medicine, surgery, paediatrics, obstetrics and gynaecology.
Monash School of Rural Health head Shane Bullock said he would like to see more rural specialty training in areas such as paediatrics.
"All of the basic training for this specialty across Victoria can be done in the rural setting, but regional training hubs need more support from the college of practitioners with accreditation," Professor Bullock said.
Medical student Saje Allen said although the school had allowed her to achieve her goals, more needed to be done to create specialist training in regional areas.
Associate Professor Janelle Brennan, from Rural Health Bendigo, said there had been a significant growth in specialist registrars choosing to practice advanced skills in Mildura, which built the region's capacity to address local healthcare needs.
Dr Brennan said medical students currently studying at Mildura's Monash campus would like to continue their advanced training locally, but there were still some challenges.
She said there was a need for colleges to be more proactive and to offer more end-to-end rural training.
"The strongest nexus of control of the training pathways is through the colleges, who need to step up and support rural communities to achieve better health care and health outcomes."
