Drew Cook said trying to get a doctors appointment frequently involves checking the appointment app and finding nothing, calling the clinic multiple times and finding the line busy, and then getting through only to be told there are no appointments.
This is the second story about how the ongoing doctor shortage in Red Lake, Ont. is affecting the people who live there.It's a sunny weekday in mid-September and the waiting room of the Goldcorp Regional Red Lake Medical Centre is eerily quiet..
The remaining physicians have reduced their workload by closing the urgent care clinic that used to take place on Saturday mornings and informing the community that they will no longer respond to messages by phone or email. Red Lake clinic patient Debbie Kozie said trying to get a doctors appointment is like trying to win a lottery. For one week in October, two doctors will trade 24-hour emergency room shifts – during which a doctor staffs the ER by day and remains on call after hours – with just one other doctor stepping in on a Tuesday while someone else does rounds at the long-term care home.
Is the clinic being managed properly? Are the older doctors in town driving the young ones away? What are they doing to recruit more colleagues? Why are they only looking for doctors with experience? She asks. The doctors she knows who have left the community have done so because the workload was unsustainable, she said. And besides, she said it shouldn't be on the doctors themselves to recruit and retain their colleagues.But Whiley knows people are frustrated, she said. She hears about it from them all the time.
The clinic has placed a sign by the reception desk warning people that abusive behavior won't be tolerated, but staff say it happens anyway. The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario recently made it much easier for physicians trained in the U.S., U.K, Ireland or Australia to come and practice in the province, and McLeod is excited by the opportunity the change presents."And they've got to have an interest in other things than staying where they are if they go to an event like that."
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