No one could have designed a better solution to the job vacancy for a GP on Argyll’s remote Atlantic Isle of Colonsay.

The island may be – it is – idyllic but such jobs are not easy to fill. Not everyone wants to live such a known life in such a small community of around 110 residents. Some who do may take such a job for the wrong reasons, full of the untested romance that is no more than a part of living in such a place.

Colonsay, has long been concerned about whether anyone and who might come to replace its former and long-term GP.

But, from a field of 4 applications, NHS HIghland has appointed a job-sharing husband and wife currently working in different medical practices in Perthshire.

Dr David Binnie and Dr Jan Brooks will jointly take up the vacant £100,000 post with a house looking to the Paps of Jura, which, with Islay, is the third in this spectacular island group.

The real gold mine in the appointment lies in the fact that Dr Binnie and Dr Brooks have been coming to Colonsay on holiday for a very long time. They know and love the island and the islanders, who know them well, could not be more delighted. David Binnie actually worked on a Colonsay farm as a youngster and his sister and brother-in-law (the McNicholls) run Colonsay’s general store.

In a dream appointment, the two doctors get to live in place they already love and to work together in providing a common service. The islanders of Colonsay not only already know their new GPs but can set aside worries abut how newcomers might cope with the specifics of life in a remote island community.

They also see the strengths of the job-share. Island GPs have to be much more widely skilled and experienced than their mainland counterparts. Because of the remoteness and the intervention of adverse weather conditions that can delay the arrival of external assistance or evacuation,  they have to be able and prepared to carry out emergency procedures as necessary. Moreover the spectrum they have to cover is extended by the swelling of the island’s population to around 700 in the summer months.

Dr Binnie and Dr Brooks feel that this appointment has come at a good point in their own careers and it has certainly come as an unexpected bonus to Colonsay.

The photograph above is of Kiloran Bay in Colonsay. It is by copyright holder Island Focus and may not be reproduced without permission.

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