Would you pay to see a family doctor faster? Quebecers are, and critics are worried

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That’s a tradeoff a lot of Quebecers are making these days. More than 780 doctors left the public system there last year, compared with 14 in the rest of Canada combined. The exodus of doctors for the private sector in Quebec has increased 70 per cent in just four years, according to data from its Health Ministry.

Patients who spoke to White Coat, Black Art describe a situation where even those who do have a family doctor may face a month-long wait for an appointment, making it a choice between getting out a credit card or waiting all day at the hospital for an acute problem like pneumonia or a urinary tract infection.

Critics say the situation in Quebec should act as a warning of what could happen elsewhere in Canada if incremental steps in the direction of privatization are allowed to add up to giant leaps.

Earlier this month, Quebec Health Minister Christian Dubé announced his government would table a bill that would force new family doctors and medical specialists trained in the province to devote the first few years of their careers to the public system.

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Or you have the experience that I had, just last night. I moved to Quebec one month ago. My Quebec Healthcare doesn’t kick in until after 3 months, so I am unable to even make an appointment to see a doctor here.

My only option was to go to the local emergency department, so last night I did so. I have an issue that is not urgent, but is affecting me and has been going on for a while.

I arrived at the hospital and there were only two other people in the waiting room. I was optimistic, but after sitting there for 4 hours and seeing many other people brought in ahead of me, I realized that there was a good chance I was at the very end of the queue, with potentially no chance of seeing a doctor.

I gave up and went home. Even the Quebec health line suggested that I go back to Ontario if I needed to see a doctor before I had Quebec health coverage.

FlareHeart

That’s crazy. Your Ontario health card is supposed to cover you for that 90 day span until you get the new Quebec card. Does Quebec not honor that system? (I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t have to since they seem to get special snowflake treatment around everything else)

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Their Ontario card would’ve covered their ER visit. I’m from QC and lived in BC for a while, my Quebec card did not allow me to get an appointment in clinic, but ER and walk-in would’ve been covered

FlareHeart

Wow… Our system is even more broken than I thought.

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It is by design.

Decades of sabotage. It was managed by and for the doctors. Under the threat that they would leave the province, we gave them everything. They operate as private entities within the hospitals and can bill whatever medical acts they want with little surveillante.

My kid would need an appointement with a specialist: the waiting list was six months. Or I could see THE SAME FUCKING DOCTOR at his privately owned clinic the next week.

Obviously, when you’re ill and have the mean and access, you will pay. In the end, it’s the poors that pay the price of a worse service.

I could rant about Bonjour Santé and their shady businees practice, but let’s just say the private sector has its foot, and more, in the door for a long time by now.

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Yep, my wife needed a skin biopsy for research, so not emergency like skin cancer, but it would further research on her genetic disease. Wait time of months with referral, or pay $1000 and a private dermatologist could see us immediately in her office. Since it directly affected progress of the genetherapy the labs were doing, we chose to pay it. But I’m jumping the queue because I have more money than another patient, and that ain’t right.

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If you’re not urgent you’re 100% at the end of the line. I’ve been at both ends, the front and the back. The front sucks way more. They bring you in fast if you have a potentially fatal condition. And it sucks.

I know waiting sucks too but better than being close to kicking off. Public clinics around here (BC) are generally reasonable if you don’t have a family MD. Go in first thing in the morning to get on the list and they’ll call you back an hour or so before they can see you so you don’t need to wait in the lobby all day.

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I wonder how much extra money is wasted on the beauracracy of making healthcare harder to access. We should really just have a nationalized system.

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It makes perfect sense to register at an emergency room and then leave, so you don’t clog up the waiting room and get exposed to all the diseases that are there.

The issue, of course, is legal liability if someone comes into the emergency department and then is told to leave.

I’ve actually never heard of being called back by an emergency room. I very much have a sense that no thought at all is given to patients’ time.

FlareHeart

I agree… But then all of the provincial premiers would whine about “muh jurisdiction!”

Look at what happened with Alberta and the recent changes to nationalized subsidies for certain common medications.

Our provincial governments are actively inhibiting the system from getting better.