Some may claim professional arrogance on the part of the doctors, but I really can't blame them for resigning. They have to make a statement that will be noticed. The way that the bloated, top heavy NHA operates,in my opinion, they are not really aware of conditions beyond their petty bureaucracies, something 'big' has to happen, in order to penetrate the collective thick skulls of middle and upper mismanagement. Having said that, I have certainly met my fair share of arrogant doctors.
metalman.

And who can blame the doctors for resigning?
The truly sad part is,I suspect that the Liberals and Northern Health would like nothing better than to have everyone in Burns Lake go to Vanderhoof or Prince George for medical attention.
It is all about money when it comes to health boards.
If they and their Liberal counterparts(Kevin Falcon)think there is a pot full of dough to be saved by forcing people to travel for their medical services,don't think for one second it won't happen.
It can and it will.

Great headline - not much of a story.

How about somebody telling us "Why" they have tendered their resignations.

What are the issues? Are the requests legitimate? What are the looking for?

Where is the rest of the story?

Maybe if people would stop abusing the health care system we'd be able to spend a bit more money retaining our doctors and nurses.

Maybe if some of the fat was trimmed from the mid and upper level bureaucracy, there would be more money to spend on retention.
Abuse of the system could not possibly cost as much as the mismanagement does already.
Just an opinion.
metalman.

I agree metalman!
The upper crust of Northern Health and other health boards throughout the province are VERY well paid,indeed!
I am just not sure why,considering they are not the ones doing the work!

So much for the Hippocratic oath.

The Hippocratic oath says, "Do no harm", it doesn't a damned thing about working under deplorable conditions because the regime in Victoria want to pour the $$$ into the Lower Mainland health authorities because that's where the votes are. If they can'r get a day, get anyone to cover a locum, or find adequate services and resources for their families, who can blame them for wanting to ply their trade elsewhere?
Totally agree about the bureaucracy at NHA, but then again what do you expect? We all know that management sees the value in having more management over the value of more front-line workers. This is nothing new, even though it's appalling in its blithe disregard for the needs of patients.
Finally, yes, we've all seen arrogant doctors, but I've seen just as many arrogant loggers when I worked out on the west coast. There are dicks in all walks of life.

Doctor shortage could be dealt with if the doctors union wasn't so damn strong. Increasing the supply of doctors would address the shortage, potentially reduce costs and better care.

right on faxman!!! Well said!!!

Lots of opinions - - still no facts!

What do they want?

30 odd years ago, PGRH had close to 500 beds. There was one administrator, one chief of nursing, and a secretary. They would regularly visit the docs' coffee room and sling the bull. We knew each other on a first name basis.
Now we have less than half the beds, and if you're in one, you'd better not spend too much time in there; and that's true even if your bed is in the shower room! Noone knows how many administrators there are or where to find them. Some are in the HSBC building; somewhere in the two floors occupied, and third one being totally gutted and refurbished. They could be in the Red Cross building or one of two or three schools, or in the old courthouse, or the old Bay building, etc.. They all have a retinue of "administrative assistants," etc., etc.. Sure they govern the whole NHA, but??
And don't forget in the mid 80's the wisdom was that the expense of Medicare was directly the fault of all those doctors. If you have all those doctors, they attract patients, so we have to cut back on all those bloody medical schools and nursing schools, and the problem will be solved. Like metalman says, it's top heavy. I know Ben has tried to find out what percentage of Medicare costs are attributed to administration, but he couldn't. It's all lumped in with "patient care."
It's hard to give good care to patients when they are viewed as simply a big cost to the system. For the most part, Burns Lake has had superb family doctors. It would indeed be interesting to find out why they left.
Get on it Ben.

30 years ago there were doctors that lit up a cigarette right beside the bed of their patient while they talked to them. Who cares what was happening 30 years ago. To be perfectly honest, the docs that were hanging around PGRH 30 years ago could be part of the problem. Talk to people who work at the hospital about the issues there and while NHA management is definitely a concern, so can be the egotistical old time docs who think they own the place.

Anyway, I suspect people are leaving Burns Lake for loads of reasons. Not being able to practice may be one of them, being overworked may be another and just wanting to retire may be an issue. The question is not why are they leaving, I think the more important question is how does Burns Lake attract docs? I know it's not popular to say, but let's be honest here folks, if you were a new doc (who's services are in demand pretty much everywhere in Canada), would you set up shop in Burns Lake?

As for administrative costs at NHA, yes, I'm sure there is money to be saved. It's not as easy as some people think though. 30 years ago everything was hand written and you didn't need specialized support staff. Now you need an IT department. 30 years ago there were no problems finding nurses to work at PGRH. Now you need an HR department with recruiters just to try and lure people here to meet patient demands. The list could go on and on. It really should be a matter of public record where the money is spent (in specific terms) and perhaps having an oversight board comprised of hospital mgmt, and lay representatives would be worthwhile to look at.

To add to my last post, has anyone ever considered that perhaps there is also a funding issue? The Province will tell you that the investments in health care have never been higher (and they could be right), but are the expenditures enough to meet current patient demands and requirements?

Maybe some questions should be addressed to the Provincial Government in regards to why health care suffers, yet there is money to invest in Olympic Games, a new roof for BC Place, ad campaigns telling everyone how great the HST is, etc.

Four doctors in one community! Resigning en masse. Why does my mind wonder why NIH isn't issuing a statement saying "We have had discussions with these incredibly wonderful physicians and we will fix this problem very quickly, and we apologize for dragging them through the mud on extraneous issues that have everything to do with someones bloated self importance here at NH"
Just wonder if this is what happened.
This is just a story, no truth to it, just my imagination working..........
Would love to see honesty in statements issued.

"He says Northern Health is fully committed to providing health care in the area, including emergency and hospital care."

Well, it's no use to panic yet.

And we don't know what caused them to take this action.

It may have nothing to do any of the reasons mentioned above.

Why don't the doctors make a public statement? Are they overworked or is there a lack of work?

Burns Lake is identified as a village in the story - how many doctors can a village support?

I suspect that they are over worked and have trouble getting time off.

They probably want a system like they have in Fraser Lake where the Doctors (as far as I know) are paid a salary, and they releive each other for holidays etc;

If they had the same system in Burns Lake and paid the Doctors a huge salary, with all the benefits, then I suspect that they would be happy.

Maybe there are not enough patients for them to make a dollar. Who knows. Its not like Prince George or Vancouver where you can run as many clients through per day as you can handle, and get paid accordingly.

Hopefully we will get some more information on this story.

Provincial government makes hundreds of millions off resource royalties from northern communities to pay for top notch health care in the lower mainland... then they complain about the costs for northern circumstances to receive even a fraction of the level of service in northern communities as is expected in southern parts of the province.

IMO get rid of the Northern Health Authority and implement a Northern Province of BC where our resource royalties stay in the north to properly fund northern services with direct oversight from elected representatives that are accountable for these services without passing the buck to their ineffective vote in Victoria.

" Posted by: hood rich on February 4 2011 1:31 PMDoctor shortage could be dealt with if the doctors union wasn't so damn strong. Increasing the supply of doctors would address the shortage, potentially reduce costs and better care."


Hey Dopey! The doctors are the union. Same as any other union.The people are what makes the union. People like you that think unions are made up of some alien life form that have us humans under their control should refrain from posting comments about things of which you know nothing about.