CBC Ontario Today podcast shared on August 14, 2019
Covered by Rita Celli, CBC Ontario Today
The Topic: 'Can't Find A Family Doctor'
Mark (patient)
11:43
I moved down from Nunavut almost 4 years ago where my medical services, for about eleven and a half years, were provided a couple hundred miles north of the Arctic Circle, primarily by registered nurses and nurse practitioners. So perhaps I was a bit more amenable to those services. In other words, I understood the fantastic services that they can provide. Then after about a year after I moved down to Ontario, on the list, with Health Care Connect... I discovered the Dorset Community Health Hub*. There are others in the province, and I would encourage everyone to support them and also for the government to continue to support them and to expand [them]. I receive services directed by a nurse practitioner. [It's] an incredibly wholistic medical care. All a great team there in Dorset. It's not an emergency room but you can book ahead for the small scrapes and so forth and maybe save some time instead of going to Huntsville Memorial District Hospital.
...The two nurse practitioners there that I have had for the past 3 years have dealt with in individual appointments with physical health matters, mental health matters. Very wholistic healthcare and I think I am very fortunate not to have found a traditional medical doctor after moving here.
Professor Bordeaux
14:50
I think that Mark identified a really, really important resource that we often don't think about when we're looking at primary care providers. So it's not only family physicians, or general practitioners. Some medical specialists can provide primary care, but nurse practitioners are a form of primary care providers. We have a lot of data and evidence to show that you get high quality primary care from nurse practitioners. They have a relationship with a physician for whom they consult with on some more serious cases, but this is, again, looking at a whole of the healthforce approach to this. There are a variety of different providers who have different skills to enable coverage of services for clients like what Mark is getting in Lake of Bays.
*The Dorset Community Health Hub is a partnership between the Algonquin Family Health Team, Lake of Bays Township, Dorset Canada & the Township of Algonquin Highlands
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