So speaking of John Horgan and the NDP’s taking a pulse on health care, when is this Lib-Con government going to do something about the doctor and nursing shortage here in the north? Oh that’s right, it doesn’t exist because our health care system is all sunshine and moonbeams.

Come on sage, we never ask embarrassing questions of the rightists because we all know the only response we will get is that it (is, was, will be – choose one) the NDPs fault. I do wonder, though, if health care under the NDP was so bad then and so good now under the rightist Liberals, why were there enough doctors in Quesnel then and not enough now, especially when you consider that they were going on about expanding the Quesnel hospital so people could get care when they needed it and where they needed it. That was their slogan, wasn’t it? I don’t recall the people of Quesnel being expected to provide freebies to doctors to get them to live there, do you?

Incidentally, we used to have a hospital in Ladysmith, then under the rightist Liberals it was demoted into a Primary Care Clinic using a mulch-disciplinary approach. About a year ago they fired one of the doctors because she was using up too many resources (read spending too much money) caring for her patients. That’s the future, my friends, if the rightists stay in control.

That should be multi-disciplinary not mulch-disciplinary, although it feels like I’m being left alone to mulch back into the ground sometimes!

And how would you lefties suggest that we solve the Doctor shortage in the North?? Would you make it mandatory that new Doctors practice in the North?? That’s been tried before and it was found to contravene human rights legislation!
Would you offer monetary incentives? Perhaps if the extra dollars are significant enough you might attract a few…but then if the only reason a Doctor is practicing in the North is for the extra money, do you really want them?
Do you train more? Sure more money could be thrown at the medical schools to turn out a few more doctors, but again where they practice is their choice!
Do you make it easier for foreign Doctors to get accreditation? Might help, but see the comment above…they will practice where they choose!
Did I miss any options? Do you lefties have any better ideas? Or are you more content to sit on the sidelines and bitch without ever coming up with a useful and workable solution?

Typical rightie comment, I count no less than 9 questions in your comment NyteHawwk. However, that is the LIB-Con tactic; ask questions but never supply answers. Providing answers is what we on the left do, and here is the answer to your first question, and probably all the rest: Vote and elect an NDP government in two years, only then will all these health care issue be addressed.

Sophie says “Vote and elect an NDP government in two years, only then will all these health care issue be addressed”!

“Only then”, haha!
”
Well, that’s got to be one of the dumbest statement that you have posted here, and you (just like me) have posted your share of dumb things! ;-)

How does it feel to be just as dumb as a redneck Conservative?

Well, Hart Gut, many of us who agree with the Sage don’t consider ourselves to be like you.

This is clear, the mighty righties in the Liberal party have made it clear by actions that the health care system is not a priority with them. They have let it deteriorate ever since they assumed power until it has reached the dismal state it is now in. Voting Liberal will not fix that.

The NDP has clearly stated that they will address the defects in the health care system. So, the choice is clear, elect a party that doesn’t give a damn or elect the NDP who do. maybe the NDP won’t be able to solve all the problems, maybe they can only solve a few, but that will make the system considerably better than the mess we have now under the Liberals.

To answer NyteHawwk, doctors will go to where they can make a living commensurate with their responsibilities. As long as they can do that in areas they consider more desirable, then they will go there. the resolution is to have enough doctors in those desirable communities so that those looking for a place to practice won’t move there because they can’t make a good enough income. Then they will look at places like PG.

If monetary incentives will work, then yes, offer them. That is, after all, what Quesnel is doing in a round about way. I believe that doctors are ethical and will meet medical standards whether they receive monetary incentives or not. I do not think that doctors who would receive them are in any way inferior, nor would the treatment they provide be inferior. In fact, your inference is quite insulting to them.

Yes, train more doctors. Train enough so that they must work outside the major centers to make a decent living. Reread the paragraph which starts, “To answer NyteHawwk…”.

Yes, make it easier for foreign doctors to practice in Canada. Foreign doctors have been a major source in the past and many of them practiced in PG for a long time. I seem to recall that there were several Irish and South African doctors in PG. Accept them from any country or university which has graduates meeting Canadian standards. However, I would prefer that more doctors be trained in BC from BC residents so as not to deprive other countries of a badly needed skill set and provide a career for our own youth.

Wow..Sophie…your response isn’t even worth commenting on…it’s the common refrain of the constant whiner that does not have the capacity to even think of a solution…just whine whine whine.! Go back to Mommies Basement!
At least ammonra responded with a reasoned argument.
I would still suggest that what you propose will not work for the simple reason that Doctors will not move to the North if they can practice medicine in the Okanagan or the Lower Mainland and make a living at it. Doctors in the North are faced with a virtual 24/7 practice by virtue of their case loads. We lose many good Doctors to burn out because of this fact. Not so busy and stressful in the southern more populous area of the province!
In order for all of the ideas around producing more Doctors for the north to work there would need to be such an oversupply of Doctors that they would have no choice but set up shop in the less desirable areas…possible I guess but that is a long term solution, after all it takes approximately 12 years to train a Doctor!
Once again…its not an easy problem to overcome, and waiving a magic wand or electing an NDP Government is not going to provide the answer.

Nytehawwk has probably the most intelligent reply on this one. It takes 12 years, at least $325,000 in loans and a lot of brains, hard work and dedication for one to become a doctor. The cost to train one is probably around another $250,000 each one at least. I think this government has done a fairly good job providing additional seating at the four universities. I think there is probably close to 275 medical students that will or are graduating each year now. The problem is, frankly, we are an older, not so-healthy-as-we-should-be population,and whichever government is in power, the funds are not there for everything.

I know of young doctors who are very happy practicing in northern and rural areas, and they chose to go there because of the medical experience they would receive there.

Still, I don’t think Quesnel has a bad idea; they just need to find the right doctor that wants to go there and try it out for a while and then see if he wants to make it permanent.

A house and car are a nice incentive.

ammonra, please take a moment to research and post provincial health care spending dollars for the past dozen years or so. I’d be very surprised to see that spending hasn’t increased each and every year.

Unfortunately demand has also increased. Who is to blame for increased demand? An aging demographic for sure, but what about the fact that we just don’t take care of ourselves?

Fix Healthcare by electing the NDP?
Nope, the solutions are with you and me!

The Alberta NDP’s new Finance Minister, Joe Ceci (a social worker and career politician) has recently passed an Order in Council to authorize the borrowing of up to 6 Billion dollars!

His plan to balance Alberta’s budget includes the following statement:

“The way we get there is really ensuring that we keep public services strong. It’s ensuring that we diversify and grow and it’s ensuring that we as efficient as possible going down the road.”

So, looks like he plans to balance the Alberta Budget by spending lots and lots on public services.

By the way, Kathleen Wynne’s Ontario Liberals are on track for an 11 Billion dollar deficit this year!

Our BC Liberals don’t look so bad by comparison!

NyteHawwk states; “Doctors in the North are faced with a virtual 24/7 practice by virtue of their case loads. We lose many good Doctors to burn out because of this fact.”

Wow, you are a frikken genius, doctors up here have heavy case loads and 24/7 practices because there is a doctor’s shortage up here, like I stated in my first comment on this thread. Basically your comments says; doctors are leaving because we have a doctor shortage up here… wow, just wow. o_O

Hey Hart Guy, we have a doctor and nursing shortage up here in northern BC, commenting about other provinces deficits is not going to help here.

The usual gibberish about Doctors in the North.

Seems people cant get their head around the fact that a lot of people including doctors do not want to live and work in the North. This has been an ongoing problem for years and years.

The slogan **Train them in the North and they will stay in the North** is a bunch of hooey.

Doctors and others have a lot of options in BC and elsewhere, and it is tough to get them to come North. Its not rocket science, its just common sense.

I wouldn’t be surprised that they are sick and tired of hearing the whining from the lefties, and leave just to clear their heads.

“B.C. is falling further behind in addressing a critical shortage of family physicians and the government won’t meet a promise to provide a family doctor to everyone who wants one by the end of this year.”

“Health Minister Terry Lake said that despite progress, he is now unsure when the province will be able to get every British Columbian access to a family physician. The Liberal government had promised to do so in 2010, as well as during its 2013 re-election campaign.”

Doesn’t seem to matter what the campaign promises made are 100,000 LNG jobs or a doctor for every person in BC, this Lieberal government never delivers!

2013 BC numbers of physicians/100,000 from the CMA (Canadian Medical Association)

In 2000 it was 196 in 2013 it was 225. In 1993 it was 199. That was the high number since CMA on the internet stop in 1986.

Those of you who are math whizzes can see that during the NDP era the number dropped while the number increased by 15% from 2000 onward.
Actually it did not really start to climb significantly until 2008, when it was still at 201. Over a 5 year period, the increase was over 2%/year.

Not to rub salt into the wound, but does the name Paul Ramsey, the NDP Minister of Health come to mind with the Doctor dispute?

It is the remote region problem which has to be solved.

Newfoundland might have the answer. They have 241 per 100,000. Nova Scotia is even better, although not quite as remote. They have 262/100,000, the highest in the country. New Brunswick has more as does Quebec. We have more than any other region west of Quebec. Looking at that I am starting to think it has something to do with culture and community. Saskatchewan is significantly lower at 184.
The NWT and Nunavut are basket cases. 99 for one and 30 for the other.

What were people saying about shortage for the province? The shortages are in SOME rural areas.

A woman years ago in an Antarctic out post operated on herself using telepresents from the USA . Why are we not embracing telepresents . Hook it up to South Africa and they won’t have to come here to live at all . A specialist is only a click away . Heck when AI gets good enough we shouldn’t need doctors at all . At least those AIs won’t be run on greed .

To see just what kind of a problem we have, Idug down a bit more and got these numbers for 12 BC communities.

The numbers are in order starting with General Practitioners, Specialists, total MDs, ratio of specialist/GP, census agglomeration population 2014 based on StatsBC, number of MDs/100,000 population

Sorted by the last number which shows PG has more than the provincial average MDs/100,000
Victoria 544 538 1082 0.99 356,685 303
Nanaimo 147 123 270 0.84 103,282 261
Williams Lake 41 8 49 0.20 18,911 259
PG 132 88 220 0.67 85,996 256
Kamloops 134 128 262 0.96 102,818 255
Terrace 25 14 39 0.56 16,246 240
Kelowna 222 218 440 0.98 190,246 231
Dawson Creek 21 5 26 0.24 12,465 209
Prince Rupert 18 3 21 0.17 12,496 168
Abbotsford 169 122 291 0.72 176,238 165
Chilliwack 113 37 150 0.33 97,451 154
Fort St John 39 5 44 0.13 29,739 148

We are 4th from the top (left out the GVRD since it is a provincial referral centre as well)

When sorted by the ratio of specialists per GP/family doctor we are in the middle of the list. Since we have a medical program here, I am not sure why the ratio is so low. I think that is our real problem here from the point of view of quality of medical care.

Victoria 0.99
Kelowna 0.98
Kamloops 0.96
Nanaimo 0.84
Abbotsford 0.72
PG 0.67
Terrace 0.56
Chilliwack 0.33
Dawson Creek 0.24
Williams Lake 0.20
Prince Rupert 0.17
Fort St John 0.13

I went through figures for Alberta as well. They are about the same and many are worse.

Health minister terry lake ? Wasn’t that kid parks minister a minute ago ?

Final thoughts … We can still do better. The remote area problem is a Canada wide problem other than in the Maritimes.

BC does better than any province west of the Quebec border.

If we had continued in the non-direction taken by the government before 2001, we could join hands with Saskatchewan which is the worst province in Canada for doctors per 100,000 population.

Terry Lake is actually a DVM, a Veterinarian.

The Minister of Health under the NDP was an English instructor at CNC. He came to Canada to evade the draft in the USA.

The education quite frequently does not match the portfolio that MLAs. And you know that, so don’t pretend you do not.

Dr. Jerri Lin Nielsen was an American physician with extensive ER experience, who in 1998 was hired to spend a year at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station, as the station’s only doctor.

During the southern winter, at a time when the station is physically cut off from the rest of the world, she developed breast cancer. Nielsen teleconferenced with medical personnel in the United States, and had to operate on herself in order to extract tissue samples for analysis. A military plane was later dispatched to the pole to airdrop equipment and medications. Her condition remained life-threatening, and the first plane to land at the station in the spring was sent several weeks earlier than planned, despite adverse weather conditions, to bring her to the U.S. as soon as possible. Her ordeal attracted a great amount of attention from the media, and Nielsen later wrote an autobiographical book recounting her story.

Sounds quite different from you stupid version, Ataloss.

Hart Guy said, “ammonra, please take a moment to research and post provincial health care spending dollars for the past dozen years or so. I’d be very surprised to see that spending hasn’t increased each and every year.”

In terms of absolute dollars I am sure it has, and it has done so every year since medicare began regardless of which government was in power. That is because the population increases steadily and inflation steadily eats away at what a dollar will buy. Of course health care costs in dollar amounts increase.

However, I did what you suggest once and tracked health care funding over several years as a percentage of the Gross Provincial Product (GPP), the provincial equivalent of the federal GDP. I found that the amount varied a little but only by about 1% over several years. It did not always decrease, sometimes it increased. The best health care (based on patient satisfaction) seemed to be delivered when about 9% of the GPP went to health care. This was some time ago and involved Socred and NDP governments.

I do not believe that the situation is any different now, except that the percentage is about 8%, and may be lower, and I do remember reading an article in some news medium or other which did that evaluation during the last few years. What that tells me is that health care funding is very sustainable, since it has been sustained for 40 years or so and is still being funded, although at a slightly lower level than in the past. Even if the funding were increased to the 9% level, or thereabouts, it would still be sustainable. This constant complaint by right wing politicians and their supporters who have a major fixation on reducing taxes to as close to zero as they can manage, even if that means giving away resources without receiving proper royalties, is just political posturing. This is a rich country and Canada can well afford a decent health care system.

Found the smoking gun evidence that Health Care in BC is getting WORSE under this incompetent Lib-Con government:

“Doctors of B.C. (formerly the B.C. Medical Association) estimates that some 220,000 British Columbians don’t have a family doctor, up from 176,000 in 2005.”

http: //tinyurl.com/nst22rz

Sometimes I use tinyurl because the original url is too long and will stick out past the comment box. This link is to The Province News website.

Thanks for that vote of confidence gopg . Search telemedicine and be amazed or if you’re in the field , crap your pants cause it’s coming for your job . Why should we not have access to the best the world has to offer ?

There is a world of difference between conferring with a cancer specialist on a telephone or Skype and just anyone doing an operation.

This individual was the station MD. On top of that she was an ER specialist. She know how to operate. All she wanted to confer about is what dos she do since she suspected she had cancer and where exactly should the biopsy be taken. In fact, some biopsies can be done with needles.

This is not a do-it-yourself game to be played unless it really has to be.

Have you ever been to a GP in PG. It is like stepping into the dark ages when you look at the equipment. Most of them barely know how to use a computer to take a history and give comparisons over time of your CBC for instance.

BTW, Quesnel is a level 3 or level 4 trauma centre and to have that unavailable means transferring any serious injury case, such as an industrial incident or a vehicular crash incident to PG by ambulance or directly to Vancouver by BC Ambulance plane.

Costly and life threatening. Northern Health is responsible for that and does not seem to be on top of it.

Gopg you confirm my argument . The college of phycians are standing in the way of technology . The Qualcomm xprize triquartor is rapidly coming to fruition . The finalists have been picked . The Heath care industry is ripe for disruption and that’s the hope of billions . Not just us .

Gopg did you know that in France when one is in an accident .when the ambulance shows up it contains a qualified trauma doctor ? Why ? Because the French are a bit brighter than Canadians and their doctors don’t write the rules . The government does .

I’m going to make a public commitment to never ever feed the TROLL again.