With family doctors in short supply, communities are having to be more creative to attract physicians to their communities, and it’s only getting more complex.
RELATED: A newly-leaked internal Ministry of Health report appears to show more than 200 communities across Ontario do not have family doctors who are taking on new patients, a fact Ford government critics have jumped upon. Global News' Queen's Park Bureau Chief Colin D'Mello reports – Nov 27, 2024The Ontario College of Family Physicians reported in July that 2.6 million Ontarians are without a family doctor, up from 1.8 million in 2020.
“We also have seen studies that 65 per cent of physicians who answered a recent survey are in the next five years thinking of stopping their practice,” the president said.As millions of residents continue to be without family doctors, the pressure it puts on communities to provide adequate health care is only growing.
He said that while he is happy with the success of the communities, they still need to bring three more physicians to the area, pointing to the need to continuously compete against neighbouring areas. Peabody is pushing for a common funding base for physician recruitment that is available to all municipalities to create a “level playing field.”Jill Croteau, the physician recruitment specialist for the Niagara Region, said to get doctors to the area, they sometimes have to offer up to a $100,000 signing bonus for commitment to stay for a set amount of time.
She also pointed to salaries, saying that family doctors need to be paid more by the province for the amount of work they are doing.“Family physicians very commonly will be asked to take on more and more, and eventually, that well of good intentions will run dry, and we need to start refilling that,” he warns.
In an attempt to attract new family doctors to the city, the local government plans to initially offer benefits to new doctors who join its municipal clinic and cover things like admin costs and rent, which can be a barrier to setting up a new practice.The idea is based on a similar plan by Colwood, B.C., Coun. Ralph Cipolla told Global News.
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