A small town in Northern Ontario
could soon be left with no local physicians after all
six doctors in the community recently announced they are
leaving. The news of the exodus came in an advertisement
in the local newspaper of Geraldton, ON. Now, the aging
community of roughly 3,000 could be completely doctorless.
But mayor Michael Power says he's confident that temporary
doctors will be in place come moving day.
"We will have a full complement
of doctors in place," Mr Power says. "As a first step,
with the ministry of health's assistance, we will have
doctors in place to ensure that the hospital, emergency
room and basic healthcare will continue." He adds, "Step
two is the recruitment of a longterm arrangement with
doctors [for the community]."
The province's health minister,
George Smitherman, recently spent a question period
in the provincial legislature answering opposition critics'
pointed questions over the loss of Geraldton's doctors.
He said the province will replace them as soon as possible.
"This hospital is part of a five-hospital
network, which means that there is other strength in
the region that we can depend upon," he said. "The people
of Geraldton will not be left abandoned."
A
QUEEN'S PARK CARROT
Mr Smitherman is working on a plan to raise the pay
of Ontario physicians by about $1 billion over four
years. It would also boost the pay of doctors who work
outside traditional hours in rural areas like Greenstone
by up to 35%.
Mr Power says his community has
always struggled to find and keep doctors, even though
the six in the community were among the highest paid
in the province, according to the Ontario Health Association.
Power has set a deadline of March 10 for the health
ministry to assure him that temporary doctors will be
ready to care for the community until permanent physicians
can be found.
"Because of our location being
14 hours north on Yonge Street [in Toronto], it means
it has always been a bit of a challenge [to find doctors],"
Power says. "To my knowledge, we've never had an emergency
where every doctor said they would leave on the same
day. It's an anomaly and it certainly jangled the nerves
of our community, the health minister and the government."
DIRE
COINCIDENCE
All six physicians, who will be gone by May 13, say
they didn't plan to leave at the same time and were
each leaving for personal reasons. Dr Saralaine Johnstone,
one of the doctors packing up her practice, told the
Canadian Press: "This is not how any of us wanted this
to end. We've certainly expressed our regret on the
impact that this is going to have on the community."
According to the Thunder Bay
Chronicle-Herald one of the six physicians, Coroner
Dr Roy Laine, would likely continue practising in Geraldton
provided he's not the only doctor in town.
Premier Dalton McGuinty gave a
speech where he told of 140 Ontario cities and towns
which are short of doctors. The Coalition for Family
Physicians in Ontario recently launched an ad campaign
to draw attention to the fact that one in 10 Ontarians
— that's a million people — are without a
family physician. The Ontario Medical Association predicts
that this number will just keep growing as hundreds
of doctors retire over the next few years.
It's in small communities like
Geraldton where the shortage of physicians is most acute.
Geraldton is part of the amalgamated municipality of
Greenstone. It's situated 100 kilometres north of Lake
Superior, three hours drive from Thunder Bay. Thirty-five
percent of its population is over 50 years of age, according
to Mr Power.
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