Empowering patients the key to new women’s and general healthcare clinic opening shop in Harvey

Cutting saws, hammers and trolleys. Tradesman weave in and out of a small shopfront behind a financial planning business on Hayward Street, trying to ensure a tight deadline is met. It is Thursday and what is very much a work in progress is scheduled to open on Tuesday with a different set of tools: stethoscopes, blood pressure checkers and weight scales. The work is on a new medical clinic in Harvey which is set to become the centre of town for women’s health. An in-demand medical practitioner both in and outside the South West region, Dr Purity Carr is set to relocate her women’s, menopause and wellbeing centre from Cookernup this week as part of a new general practice with business partner Professor Martin Samy. The three key factors driving the relocation for Dr Carr are growth in demand, accessibility and empowering new doctors going into general practice. “GPs are well placed to deal with menopause because it affects women in so many different areas,” Dr Carr said. “Menopausal women are more likely to have a high blood pressure, they’re more likely to be overweight, they’re more likely to have sleep problems. Women after menopause are three times more likely to have a heart attack or stroke. “Women want more and we can only give it when we have a good structure like this (practice) and other doctors that able to do more, which I am empowering to do more.” Her new home will be located within the new Samy Medical Practice in Harvey, which begins business this week. Alongside Dr Carr, there will be two bulk-billing general practitioners and a pathology collection room. The practice already operates out of locations in Rockingham and Canning Vale, with Professor Samy the chief executive. A professor of social responsibility, he said he wanted to set up practices which are easily accessible and provide affordable care. “I visited some country towns and I couldn’t believe that people were finding it hard to see a doctor and are forced to go online and use online GP services,” he said. “I believe it is important that I create an environment that is financially sustainable for a bulk billing medical practice, and this is what I do.” His focus is more on ensuring Harvey residents have access to a bulk billing doctor, with Professor Samy noting he will probably need to use a bulk billing doctor once he is retired. “I do not want to have a situation where I get up one morning and say ‘I’ve been having this headache for a week, but if I go and see my GP I might be $60 out of pocket. Do I really need that or should I just go and get some paracetamol and hope it goes away?’ “Do you want to second guess on your health? You don’t want to do that.” For Dr Carr, the new practice will allow her to keep focusing on her passions. After completing a course on menopause, her interest in the area grew and she soon starting noticing things with perimenopausal women and pre-menopausal women, generally in the 40s, who had menopausal symptoms and whose periods were starting to change. “These women would have anxiety or depression, they’ll even have insomnia,” she said. “Then I started to realise that if I asked these women a simple question or two - how are your periods? Could it be your hormones? - the women would say ‘actually, yes, I think it is’. “These women know what’s happening, but they don’t know how to get help.” Some of her patients were prescribed diazepam or drinking alcohol to self medicate, while others would be seeking pain medication due to menopause symptoms of aches and pain. “So then I realised that I could change this woman’s life very quickly, without me giving any sleeping pills, not giving any addictive medication and that opened up my eyes,” Dr Carr said. She is now an advocate for women receiving hormone therapy, seeing the results of her efforts. “All I do is menopause...and I can see that there’s a theme,” she said. “When I ask them, ‘looking back, when did your symptoms start?’, they all started in their 40s and they said ‘I did not know’, so these women need to know. “If we can empower these women with the right information, to know what to ask or what to tell a GP, that hormone replacement is safe, that is transformational.” Although she does have a number of patients in the Harvey and Waroona regions, her reach is much further. Dr Carr sees women from as far south as Manjimup and Margaret River and from the Perth metropolitan area. At times, she sees clients from even further away. Last week, a woman flew over from Victoria to see her. Her passion for her work extends to women’s health information sessions such as that held in Bunbury on Friday. “I don’t get paid for any of the talks I do but I empower them so they have the right information to better their health,” she said. Harvey is a world away from where Dr Carr started her career in the United Kingdom, but the Brit seems to feel right at home in the community. She put a post on a community Facebook page last year saying she would like to have some loquats, which resulted in her receiving “tons of them” outside her house. “People love each other, there’s just this loveliness you get in country towns and I think people should get a taste of Harvey,” she said. “Harvey has a lot to offer - even the drive itself when you turn off the Forrest Highway near Pinjarra is just a peaceful drive and I get women who say that although they can see me on video because they have seen me face to face, they love the drive so they come for a road trip to Harvey and that’s just nice. “Really, there’s nothing better than fresh air.”