Rural general practice nurses could be added to New Zealand’s voluntary bonding scheme next year.

Health Minister Tony Ryall made the comments after recently announcing aged care and mental health as this year’s priorities, in a bid to bolster nursing in the embattled sectors.

The scheme encourages health graduates to establish careers in hard-to-staff specialties and communities in the country through student loan write-offs or cash incentives for three to five years.

The comments come after the Rural Nursing Workforce 2009 report found Northland was one of the highest rural areas of health deprivation.

"Growth in demand for rural area nurses will begin to outpace growth in the rural area workforce by 2020 and the size of the rural area workforce will begin to decline by 2022," the report stated.

New Zealand Nurses Organisation nursing lecturer Gill Meek said attrition rates were high for rural health professionals.

"This may in part be due to the additional stresses of rural practice," she said.

"Areas like rural nursing, mental health nursing or sole-charge aged care nursing are particularly challenging for new graduates, so appropriate support mechanisms are essential.

"All new graduates, bonded or not, should have access to high quality mentoring and supervision in their early years of practice, such as is provided for some through the Nursing Entry to Practice Scheme."

The government is yet to formalise next year’s bonding scheme priority list.

Four new areas have this year been added to the midwifery hard-to-staff list including Hawkes Bay, Hutt Valley, Taranaki and Waitemata.