Wanna know why family medicine is hard?

Dr. Jocelyn Fitzgerald sums it up perfectly.

On #NationalPhysiciansDay , I’m acknowledging the great work of all my colleagues, but also advocating for system change.

#NLHealth

“The fundamental problem for fixable health care is administration….we have a top down militaristic admin structure “ with no accountability. Andre Picard. Award winning best selling author.

On #NationalPhysiciansDay let’s acknowledge that all of our #healthcare providers, across all of #Canada have been carrying a system that would have otherwise collapsed on their shoulders. Often at great personal cost. Thank you for sure. Essential change quickly needed.

Happy #DoctorsDay to all the dedicated physicians. Family doctors deliver 52% of medical services but account for just 5.7% of national health spending. Your tireless efforts and expertise are essential to keeping Canadians healthy. ow.ly/7Xtt50Rtqst #NationalPhysiciansDay

Happy #NationalPhysiciansDay to the doctors & doctors-in-training out there putting in the work day in and day out as educators, advocate & leaders in our healthcare system

Lynette Powell Senator Ravalia Dr. Joss Reimer Dr. Alika Lafontaine MD Dr. Kathleen Ross Dr. Katharine Smart

Interesting story. The +'s; students learn from FD's and see what a complex and meaningful profession they are taking on; The -'s; thinking that we can fix FM by training FD's to be more resilant. A broken system is a broken system youtu.be/1jc0EuNkDZ0?si… via YouTube

Everyone is raising the alarm. FM is the foundation of our healthcare system and we are losing it.

It is government who needs to not only listen, but act. Now.

Jon Meddings We've been ringing alarms for all of my 33 yrs in medicine. They have only intermittently been listened to, and even less frequently acted upon.

This crisis is due to decades of refusal by many to recognize the health & economic importance of family med, and to support it well.

Medical schools raising alarm over students' lack of interest in family medicine. Significant reforms, including raising pay and reducing administrative burdens, are necessary, by Kelly Grant Marieke Walsh theglobeandmail.com/canada/article… via The Globe and Mail #MedEd

Female physicians are typically expected to take more time with patients, demonstrate more empathy, listen more.

We need to stop talking about this emphasis on communication as making female doctors “less efficient” and acknowledge the fact that it makes patients safer.

Whole towns in NL have no FD. Nearly every patient, every day in the orphaned patient clinic asks me to be their FD. People just want a familiar provider who knows them and their families. This is not too much to ask for but it’s far more than our system can provide

Here's my conversation with David Cochrane Power & Politics about the need for every Canadian to be connected to a publicly funded #primarycare team in their neighbourhood. #HealthForAll youtube.com/watch?v=KYzLlu…

torontolife.com/city/family-do…

Nurses are awesome primary care providers. Our health hub RN and LPN help triage 150 patient requests for appointments every day. They are constantly info gathering and calling patients. The system would not work without them RNUNL YOUR VOCM CBC Newfoundland Morning

RN’s are awesome primary care providers. Can’t believe I spent most of my career without RN support. Our RN’s have successfully almost cleared the waitlist for Pap screening. If you need a Pap in CentralNL call the health hub! RNUNL Town of Grand Falls-Windsor YOUR VOCM VOCM News CBC Newfoundland Morning

Clouds cleared and blue skies for #Eclipse2024 in Grand Falls-Windsor for a great viewing of the period of totality. Fantastic!

Canadian family medicine summed up in one not so funny (sad really) sketch.

NL has made the biggest cuts to post secondary funding of any province over the last 5 years according to this data

I think it is obvious that our approach to medical school admission is not optimal. A short thread.

Part of this is the economics of scarcity - we have very few training spots provided by government and so the algorithm to get into one is tortuous. /1

Medical school admissions reform is a topic I’ve drummed on about for a decade. Pleased to see Queen's University take an innovative approach to addressing the significant systemic barriers that can keep people with the potential to be great doctors out of medicine.
healthsci.queensu.ca/stories/news-a…