The recent opinion piece arguing that boutique primary care clinics exacerbate Canada’s doctor shortage presents an oversimplified view of a complex health-care crisis. While the article raises important concerns about health-care equity, the data tells a more nuanced story about the role of innovative care models in addressing our pressing health-care challenges.
According to recent Canadian Institute for Health Information data, Canada faces an unprecedented primary care crisis, with 6.5 million adults lacking access to primary care. The system’s inefficiencies cost $2.9 billion annually, while physician satisfaction and patient access continue to decline. Traditional models alone cannot solve this crisis – we need innovative solutions that maximize our limited health-care resources.
Modern health-care delivery models, including technology-enabled clinics, offer several crucial benefits:
- Improved System Efficiency: Rather than reducing access, innovative care models can enhance it through more efficient resource utilization. The data shows that administrative burden consumes 19 hours weekly per physician – time that could be better spent on patient care. Technology-enabled practices can significantly reduce this burden through streamlined operations and Artificial Intelligence (AI)-assisted documentation.
- Enhanced Care Quality: While the article suggests that comprehensive preventive care is readily available in traditional settings, the reality is that many Canadians struggle to access these services. Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) comparisons from the Gallup World Poll show Canada is among several countries that experienced significant declines in satisfaction with healthcare availability, with Canada experiencing a drop of around 20 percentage points over the past decade.
- Team-Based Care Innovation: Modern clinic models often pioneer team-based care approaches, which research shows can significantly expand system capacity . With only 5 per cent of Canadians currently having access to nurse practitioners as primary providers, innovative models that integrate multiple care providers can help address access gaps.
- Technology Integration: Rather than drawing resources away from the public system, innovative clinics often serve as testing grounds for efficiency-enhancing technologies that can be scaled across the entire health-care system. These innovations help address the $2.4 billion annual cost of interoperability gaps identified in recent studies.
- Addressing Rural Access: The urban-rural divide in health care access remains stark, with 20 per cent of our population living in rural areas but served by just 10 per cent of physicians. Virtual care and innovative delivery models can help bridge this gap, potentially reducing nine per cent of current emergency department visits through improved access.
It’s crucial to recognize that the solution to the health-care crisis isn’t choosing between traditional and innovative models – it’s finding ways to integrate both effectively. Recent data shows that chronic diseases cost our economy $190 billion yearly, with $122 billion in productivity losses. We need multiple approaches to address these challenges.
The path forward requires:
- Embracing evidence-based innovation while maintaining commitment to universal access.
- Supporting AI enabled technology integration that reduces administrative burden and improves efficiency.
- Introducing AI enabled care management applications for care managers to enhance their efficiencies.
- Including systems that evaluate the social determinants of health in the care plan for patients.
- Adding complexity care to the roster of services by care managers for high complexity, high burden patients with frequent re-admissions to hospital.
- Evaluating AI care bots such as AI nurses and physician assistants to service patients with programmable services not requiring the skill sets of medical doctors
- Developing economically sustainable models that can be scaled across the public system.
- Focusing on team-based care that maximizes the impact of our limited health-care workforce.
- Adding optional innovative health insurance benefits for services outside of the public funding basket
Rather than dismissing innovative care models, we should evaluate how their successful elements can be integrated into our public system. The real threat to our health-care system isn’t innovation – it’s maintaining the status quo in the face of mounting evidence that change is needed.
Our focus should be on building a more resilient, accessible and efficient system that serves all Canadians. This requires embracing innovation while ensuring that advances in health-care delivery benefit the entire population, not just a select few.

Nice to read a different point of view for once – instead of the usual “private” is bad bad bad. This article isn’t even reinforcing the idea that private healthcare is the way to go but rather it’s time for an open mind to explore new and different ways of doing things, since the current healthcare system isn’t working effficiently anymore….unless you have cancer. Time to stop shutting down ideas for improvement and listen to them all, there’s room for everyone and everything. I love the idea of team-based care – sometimes I don’t need to talk to a doctor, and the admin or NP or social worker is just fine!