History of the Northside Local Medical Association, lately the Brisbane Local Medical Association.
Local Medical Associations have been dotted on the medical landscape since the end of World War II. The first in Queensland was the Toowoomba and Darling Downs Medical Association, formed in the late 1940s. Redcliffe Local Medical Association was in full swing by the early 1970s and the Sunshine Coast Local Medical Association was formed in 1979.
Northside Brisbane had its own medical group, run by John Comerford and active in the second half of the 1970s. Meetings were held in a hall behind the Gympie Road Pizza Hut at Kedron. John handed the organising over to Dr Sparkes. After his untimely death, the group fell into abeyance and despite a brief attempt in the 1980s was never resurrected. The meetings were strictly clinical in nature; no medical politics.
In 1992, driven by the Queensland Branch of the Australian Medical Association, the Northside Local Medical Association was formed, with a nine-person committee. Dr Michael Kennedy, GP at Everton Park was the first President.
The inaugural meeting was held at the Powerhouse Hotel at Hamilton on 19th May 1992. More than 150 doctors were in attendance. Bimonthly dinner meetings were held thereafter. The second was held at Brothers Football Club (Crosby Park) and sponsored by Rosemount Wines. The invited speaker was the then Labor State Government Environment Minister, Pat Comben.
Despite this politically themed start to the NLMA, the great majority of presentations at NLMA dinner meetings were clinical or ethical in nature.
The Association applied to be incorporated under the Associations Incorporation Act 1981 and this was granted on 13th August 1993.
The Association’s first newsletter, entitled Synapse, appeared in autumn 1993. The editor was Dr Geoffrey Harding and in his first editorial thanked the Australian Medical Association for its organisational help, and gave special mention of AMA’s Anthony Havers who had worked on the newsletter and assisted with public relations in general.
In his first President’s Page, Michael Kennedy outlined the Aims of the Northside Local Medical Association as being to foster the medical community, encouraging interaction between members, to provide a forum for discussion of medico-political, educational, clinical and social issues, and to act as an interface between public, private and academic sectors.
Reflecting this diversity, one article in Synapse 1 debated the regionalisation changes occurring in the Queensland Health System at that time. The then Brisbane North Regional Director Dr Bryan Campbell had presented the case for ‘regionalisation’ at the previous NLMA dinner meeting (April 1993). Another article, written by Community Child Health Paediatrician Dr Simon Latham, outlined strategies to raise infant and child immunisation rates in Brisbane North.
During 1995 and 1996, ‘Euthanasia’ was a topic of intense media interest. At two dinner meetings in this period, Dr Ross Baillie (Palliative Care Specialist), Professor Tess Crammond, Anglican Archbishop Dr Peter Hollingsworth, the Director of Queensland Bioethics Centre Dr Elizabeth Hepburn and the then AMAQ President Dr Stephen Phillips presented on this issue – one that is contemporary in 2021.
The rise of medical litigation in the late 1990s and early 2000s, crisis in after-hours care (1995), the threat of ‘managed care’ (1994), changes to the University of Queensland Medical Course (undergraduate to post-graduate), the changing face of General Practice, the rise (and fall) of Divisions of General Practice are just some of the other thorny issues addressed at NLMA dinners.
NLMA dinner meeting attendees have been addressed by State Government Ministers for Health; Ken Hayward in August 1994, Mike Horan June 1996, and the last to do so, Ms Wendy Edmond in February 2000.
But the emphasis has been on the clinical, with updates on many areas of clinical medicine. Questions and comments from the floor have always been encouraged and it is this aspect of the association’s meetings that enlivened them, and demonstrated the enormous talent and experience that existed within its ranks.
In 1996, an attempt was made to hold a Post-graduate Weekend – planned for 8th to 10th June at Kooralbyn Valley Resort. Registration numbers were poor, not mirroring the numbers attending the dinner meetings, and a week out from the planned event, it was cancelled. It was never again attempted.
The load of running the Association became more and more concentrated on a few. Special mention is made of Dr Geoff Harding – one time Treasurer and President, and a long time editor of Synapse.
In the 21st Century, interest in local medical association activities declined, as did the membership. This was particularly so after the legality of a body like the AMA being involved in helping to run and organise local medical associations was thrown into doubt. Many LMAs folded between 2005 and 2015, including a previously strong Brisbane South LMA.
The NLMA struggled on. Attendances at dinner meetings in the 1990s had been 80 to 100 each meeting; these dropped to sometimes less than 20.
Synapse ceased publication in 2006. An attempted re-launch in 2010 lasted for one issue.
In 2017, approaches were received from a group of General Practitioners from the Southside of Brisbane, to attend NLMA dinner meetings. A group of six to ten Southside doctors began to regularly attend NLMA dinner meetings.
At the Annual General Meeting of the Northside Local Medical Association held on 12 February 2019, at the View Hotel (previously known as the Powerhouse Hotel where the inaugural dinner meeting of the NLMA was held in 1992), a motion was passed to extend the membership area to include the southern regions of Brisbane (as far as Logan district) and to change the association’s name to the Brisbane Local Medical Association.
The “Certificate of Incorporation on Change of Name” was issued on 8th July 2019.
Covid-19 restricted the Association’s activities in 2020, with the April and June meetings cancelled. In the latter half of 2020, AMAQ interest and involvement in the LMA was rekindled. Under President Dr Bob Brown and Past-President AMAQ Dr Dilip Dhupelia, membership is increasing, as are attendances at dinner meetings.
As we approach the 30th Anniversary of the NLMA/BLMA, the future for the Association is looking bright.