interview
D
r Dinesh Palipana was half Dr Harry Eeman from Melbourne, to challenge with regards to being
way through his medical set up the campaign group Doctors admitted to medical school and then
degree in 2010 when he had with Disabilities Australia. Together, seeking employment in the health
a car accident driving home. He was they aim to become a support system.
left fighting for his life in intensive network for both aspiring and care, with a fracture to his cervical established doctors wanting to break as a medical student at Griffith
vertebrae (C6/7) which made him a down the barriers. University, I can say that the medical
quadriplegic.
“Even in the ambulance on the
“I think our group opens up the
dialogue for allowing doctors with
way to hospital after the accident, I disabilities to give their fullest to our
kept saying I wanted to go back to communities,” Dr Palipana said.
medical school no matter what,” he
said.
Dr Palipana returned to
Griffith University in 2015 and
finished his degree, driven by
“We want to provide input to
bodies dealing with this issue, while
sharing our experience with those
following our path.”
Dr Palipana said in Australia,
“Speaking from my experience
school there did everything to make
my journey a success,” he said.
“There are several other medical
schools in Australia that also take
a positive approach to those with
physical impairment.”
He said the Australian Health
Practitioner Regulatory Authority and
the Australian Medical Association
his own determination and with doctors and medical students with have been “safe and reasonable with
encouragement from the University’s physical impairments face an uphill physical impairment”.
medical school.
This month Dr Palipana will
Photographs of Dr Dinesh Palipana are courtesy Griffith University.
finish his internship at Gold Coast
University Hospital, having worked
in the emergency department,
obstetrics and gynaecology, and
psychiatry, as well as working on
research into spinal cord injury.
In his year as an intern, Dr
Palipana said the reaction from
patients to his disability has been
mostly positive.
“I have to say that all the patients
I’ve had the pleasure of working with,
have been uniformly nonplussed by
the spinal cord injury. They have been
amazing,” he said.
His own experience working
as a doctor with disability and the
reaction from his patients prompted
Dr Palipana to join forces with Dr
Hannah Jackson from Tasmania and
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interview
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