With the population increasing and the number of doctors rapidly decreasing in the area, patients are waiting three to six weeks to book in appointments and Mrs Pham said this will only lead to poorer health outcomes of those in the community.

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At the Worrigee Medical Centre, Mrs Pham said they have gone from having 13 general practitioners to five and cannot keep up with the growing population.

"The need is enormous and it cannot be underestimated," said Mrs Pham.

"Our appointment times are pushed to three to six weeks to see the GP of your choice. We keep some appointments for emergencies each day but they are gone within minutes.

"And you have huge numbers of people inundating the practice every day, looking for appointments with the doctor."

Mrs Pham said more must be done to bring doctors to the area but is lacking in hope as the federal government's updated the Distribution Priority Area (DPA) on July 1 and did not include Nowra. The list will not be updated for another year.

Having a DPA status means medical practices can recruit from a larger pool of workers.

For instance, overseas-trained doctors are required to work in areas that have been classified as "not receiving adequate GP services for the needs of that population".

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The Department of Health website outlines that the DPA system takes into account gender, age, and the socio-economic status of patients living in an area and that there are "several criteria used to determine whether an area is eligible to be classified as DPA for GPs".

The DPA uses 829 non overlapping geographical GP catchment areas and were "developed to provide a more accurate picture of where patients access their health services and the doctor patient relationship".

If an area is assessed with lower than benchmark access to GP services, then they are given DPA status.

However, Mrs Pham said there must be more transparency as to how catchment areas are determined as she believes the growing population of Nowra was not taken into account.

"There's no transparency in the whole process," she said.

"It no way reflects the population influx that we have in the Shoalhaven and its an absolute disgrace that we are not a DPA. Especially in the Worrigee and South Nowra area, they're even putting a new school into that area.

"They need to look at the huge influxes of population to specific areas rather than catchment areas."

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Mrs Pham said she fears Nowra being left off the DPA could mean poorer health outcomes for the population.

"The most important thing is if there are less GPs and if you can't see one in a timely manner, then you have poorer health outcomes for patients," she said.

"We want to deliver good care to our patients. But unless we have the very basic instruments to do so we cannot deliver and the communities are suffering and your rural health strategy is failing."

Health Minister Greg Hunt was contacted for comment.

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