The rural health workforce warns urgent action is needed to address the lack of doctors working in rural communities across the country.
It's reignited calls for a third medical college to be established in New Zealand to train more doctors.
Ōtaki Medical Centre is the lifeline of its community, given the nearest hospital is an hour away.
But its chief executive admits it's been tough keeping it running, because of a shortage of doctors.
"It's been the most difficult and challenging part of my job and I've been in it for six years," said Kiwa Raureti.
He said recruiting and retaining doctors has been a nightmare.
"The most significant reason is the lack of availability of general practitioners," he told Newshub.
Raureti's filled his vacancies with doctors from overseas. The Rural Health Network said many rural GPs are in a similar situation.
"Over half of our rural practices, of which there are 195, currently have vacancies, and many of them are long-standing vacancies, and they're only managing to fill some of those vacancies with overseas medical graduates," Rural Health Network NZ CEO Grant Davidson said.
Davidson said we aren't training enough Kiwis.
"In Australia, if we looked at the number of medical schools per population base, New Zealand should have five - but we only have two, so we need more medical people trained in this country."
Only Auckland and Otago Universities have dedicated medical schools, reigniting calls for a third to be set up at Waikato University.
"The number of doctors that we need to be training is probably at least 200 more than we are at the moment. We need a different model of training to add some diversity," said Ross Lawrenson, professor in population health at Waikato University's Te Huataki Waiora - School of Health.
And with a study showing 64 percent of family doctors plan to retire by 2032, some experts say it's becoming more urgent to train extra Kiwi doctors.
"People need a regular GP to look after their conditions, our whole population is aging," Lawrenson said.
Because inaction is leaving rural GPs like Ōtaki Medical Centre vulnerable.
