Last week, taking in the failed negotiations between the MOHLTC and the OMA, Dr. Mario Elia voiced his thoughts in the Healthy Debate column: “Ontario doctors vs. Ontario government: we need better”. The ‘we’ in Dr. Elia’s title refers to the collective group of physicians represented by the OMA, and his arguments draw attention to …
Like most Ontario physicians, I’ve spent the past few days trying to digest our failed negotiations with the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care (MOHLTC). I don’t typically consider myself to be someone who is particularly passionate about matters of remuneration. I generally feel I’m paid adequately for the services I provide, and I think most physicians …
Within our hospital walls there rages a nightly war in the Emergency Department. The front-line soldiers (a.k.a. ‘residents’ – medical doctors still in the throes of training) work endlessly through the night to admit patients to hospital and provide care to those in need. On occasion, the combination of consistently overburdened teams and overworked residents …
Starting next year, doctors’ malpractice insurance in most parts of the country will cost a lot more – more than doubling in many places. Fortunately for physicians, however, that will affect provincial health budgets more than their own practices. Most doctors are covered by the Canadian Medical Protective Association (CMPA), a non-profit mutual defence organization …
When Anne Lyddiatt’s family doctor retired, she went looking for a new one. The Ingersoll, Ontario resident thought she’d found one for herself, her two daughters, and her granddaughter, and they filled out application forms with their health information. But only one of the four was accepted: the daughter who had no chronic conditions. “When …
Every decade or so, a new or exotic infectious disease boards a flight and lands at a Western hospital, and suddenly ethical questions of risks to health care workers and “duty to treat” are front and centre. In the 1980’s and 90’s it was HIV/AIDS. In 2003 it was SARS. Today it’s Ebola. There is no question the …
Reports of low-skilled Canadian workers being replaced with those from other countries spurred changes earlier this year to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. But they’ve made it harder for areas in need of physicians as well. The system was overhauled this summer after reports that companies were misusing the program, with Canadian workers at RBC and …
Ontario’s decision to move more hospital-based services to the community is a sensible and laudable policy that has to be backed up with appropriate safety and quality regulation, as well as reimbursement practices. In the last couple of years, in the face of clear, published evidence of quality problems in at least some private clinics …
If you’re looking for evidence-based health information in Canada, a lot depends on who – and where – you are. A physician in a teaching hospital? No problem. But family doctors in rural areas, nurses or physiotherapists have a much harder time accessing up to date materials. And the general public is more likely to find …
How do we get more doctors to practice in rural communities? This has been a long standing challenge in Canada — getting physicians to work where we need them — especially in provinces with large rural populations. Policy makers have created and implemented some promising solutions, but until recently, there has been little evidence on …
The United States began releasing the Medicare payments it made to individual doctors on April 9, a move that sparked sensational headlines and debates about privacy. The data offer insights into the $77 billion paid by Medicare’s fee-for-service program to more than 880,000 health care professionals in 2012. Should Canadian provinces follow the U.S.’s lead and publicly …
Family medicine was a popular choice among medical graduates in the 1980s, when Roger Strasser was training at The University of Western Ontario. “The residents had almost a missionary zeal that they were going to be family doctors,” he says. He shared their passion, becoming a family physician. But when he returned to Canada in 2002, after going back …
I recently attended a briefing of Ontario health system stakeholders by representatives of the famed Kaiser Permanente Health System, often called America’s leading nonprofit integrated health plan. Kaiser Permanente representatives are regularly invited to Ontario to provide advice (and maybe hope) to the rest of us that health system reforms could produce the same sort …
A poll of Canadians from earlier this year found that the environment ranks as the third most important issue to us, behind the economy and health care. In fact, Canadians are quite divided in their opinions about the environment and what we ought to be doing to protect natural resources and regulate environmental pollutants. Some of …
Five years after her life irreversibly changed, Danielle Boyd won her case and received one of the highest medical malpractice payouts in Canadian history. The agreed-upon facts: Dr. Edington, a rural family physician who also practices anesthesia, obstetrics, and emergency medicine, saw then 24 year-old patient Ms. Boyd in the Hanover ER at a little …
John Bradford always prided himself on being psychologically tough. After all, he needed to be. As one of Canada’s top forensic psychiatrists, he analyzed some of the country’s most high-profile murderers including Paul Bernardo, Karla Homolka and Robert Pickton. In order to keep healthy and reduce stress, Bradford exercised regularly and played competitive squash and …
Dear Healthy Debate community, I’m pleased to announce that Healthy Debate is launching a new feature today – a podcast we’re calling The Rounds Table. Healthy Debate’s articles and opinion pieces are aimed at a general audience, but we also produce more specialized content in the form of our patient-focused Personal Health Navigator. While the …
Herbal marijuana is not an approved drug in Canada, but court rulings have required reasonable access to a legal source of marijuana when authorized by a physician. On April 1st, Canada’s current regulatory system for medical marijuana will be replaced entirely by a new set of rules. These new regulations will have important implications for …