It may not be the complete answer to solving the doctor shortage on P.E.I. but an agreement between the province and the organization that represents physicians here is welcome and overdue.
The agreement means that doctors, through the P.E.I. Medical Society, will soon be able to play a more active role in recruiting colleagues to work here and to find better ways to support them to ensure they stay.
Recruiters at the Department of Health and Wellness and Health P.E.I. have been working diligently to fill vacant doctor positions. But despite their best efforts, about one in 10 Islanders — more than 16,000 in all — now find themselves on a waiting list for a family doctor.
The society will make a recommendation to government in March after researching to find a model for “physicians-recruiting-physicians” that would work best in P.E.I.
In announcing the agreement, Health Minister James Aylward welcomed the society’s involvement and said the more people helping to recruit doctors to P.E.I., the better.
A community organization based in Crapaud has been trying to do just that. Members of South Shore Health and Wellness Inc. have been advocating for a full-time physician since their doctor retired two years ago.
They’ve done yeoman’s work to make their community attractive for any doctor who chooses to practice there. However, on Wednesday they told a standing committee on health there seems to be a “centralization philosophy” at Health P.E.I. that makes them question its commitment to primary care in small rural communities.
They also said they were directed by Health P.E.I. not to use the word Crapaud when they advertised independently to recruit a doctor for their health centre.
On Thursday, Aylward committed in a televised interview to recruit a doctor to work at the Crapaud clinic and to support primary health care in small rural centres across the province.
He also said if municipalities want to advertise for doctors specifically for their community, they should do so.
Summerside is also getting involved in doctor recruitment through the city’s economic development department. Its director, Mike Thususka, told the Journal-Pioneer he’s often asked about medical care in the community when he meets with entrepreneurs.
“We thought it was incumbent upon us to pitch in where we could help and sell the community (to doctors).”
Just over a year ago, city staff and two Summerside doctors attended the Family Medicine Forum in Toronto — the largest gathering of family physicians in Canada.
Thususka said collaborating with Health P.E.I. and the Prince County Hospital has been “a great experience,” one that appears to be paying off.
Two new physicians came to the area last year and two more are on their way.
Other municipalities have also been pro-active as well in efforts to attract doctors to their communities and that, hopefully, will continue.
“We can do more, we can do better,” Aylward pledged in a release early this week.
Voters who handed Dennis King’s PCs a minority government last spring expect nothing less.
When it comes to recruiting doctors, it must be all hands on deck, and forging partnerships with the medical society and with municipalities may be just what the doctor ordered.
Wayne Young is a freelance writer living in Summerside.
