Dr. Sarah Newbery is a rural generalist family physician in the community of Marathon, where she has been for 27 years. She is also Associate Dean of Physician Workforce Strategy at NOSM University and a past president of the OCFP.
What happens when small health-care systems in rural communities begin to unravel? What does it take to rebuild them when they reach a breaking point? We can look to the experience of the community of Marathon in 1996 for a glimpse of the challenge.
Rural citizens are generally older, sicker and poorer than the rest of the population, and so have greater need for care if they are to achieve health outcomes equitable to the rest of the population. We have a system that is failing rural Canadians, and it must change. But what if we got it right?
The holistic style of community care that is the backbone of health care in rural northern Ontario is in jeopardy. If we care about equity, those in northern Ontario must have equitable access to the opportunity to live and die well in their communities.