Bill 41 is a piece of recently passed Provincial legislation that will have a devastating effect on your already failing health care system. Awareness of its existence is almost unknown outside the health care professions. Couched in the usual and deliberately unintelligible legal mumbo-jumbo, I am still studying it to try to determine how far reaching its effects will be. For those of you interested, I will be dealing with the bill and its implications in a separate blog. In the meantime let me over simplify it by saying it will result in a completely new layer of civil service administridiots who will dictate what health care will be available and how it should be provided. Bear in mind that most of these folks have little or no health care experience. It is my understanding that your files and documentation will be available to them. Their salaries and benefits including pension will be an additional drain on the already strapped health care budget.
The letter I have shared below expresses the concerns of the College of Family Physicians on this topic.
The name the bureaucrats have given this new bill is "Patients First Act!"
 |
|
Pulse on Family Medicine
primary care policy update
|
 |
|
|
The Paradox of Putting Patients First
Without Engaging Family Physicians |
|
|
The OCFP is disheartened that the framework for Patients First implementation is now law through the passage of Bill 41, Patients First Act, 2016 when there is a deep and growing impasse between the Ontario government and physicians, including family physicians.
This impasse has destabilized the profession and devalues the
significant role that family physicians play in keeping Ontarians
healthy. The adverse environment is not supporting the meaningful
engagement of family physicians that we know is the key ingredient for
any sustainable and effective primary care transformation efforts.
Our research
of other jurisdictions that transformed primary care confirmed that
without meaningful family physician engagement, efforts were not
successful, stalled and failed. The OCFP has been monitoring the
planning of primary care to support Patients First, much of
which has been done without the benefit of full engagement with
frontline providers. A top down approach does not reflect frontline
experiences, needs or realities of practice.
Family physicians are aware of the challenges that they and
their patients face every day. They are also aware of opportunities to
improve both primary and secondary care. Many family physicians are
leaders in clinical improvements, primary care networks, medical
education and mentoring, hospital coordination of services, and
provincial and regional committees, all aimed at changing the delivery
of health care to meet the needs of their patients and communities.
In Ontario, family physicians have often provided their
expertise without support for their time because of their genuine
willingness to improve the system for their patients, and with a genuine
belief that their input mattered. The frustration that exists currently
among Ontario's family physicians will make engagement more difficult,
and any real change challenging to implement. Further, many new family
medicine graduates and residents are facing barriers to entering into or
establishing the kinds of comprehensive team-based practices in which
they have become familiar through their training. This will have
consequences for the future of family medicine.
The bill's passage now enables moving from planning to implementation of Patients First. The
government now needs to address the issues that are challenging for
family physicians in practice such as wait times for specialists,
inconsistent information to improve coordination between primary care
and the hospital sector, patient accountability, and equitable access to
inter-professional health-care provider resources.
The OCFP hopes the Ontario government will place a high value
on the services of family physicians and not continue to expand the
services of other providers without a vision for primary care, the Patient's Medical Home,
that supports the critical role of the family physician working with an
inter-disciplinary team to provide comprehensive, coordinated and
continuous care for patients.
The Board of Directors of the OCFP is discouraged by the
ongoing tensions between the government and the medical profession, and
will continue to advocate for the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care
to reach a negotiated agreement with the OMA, ratified by the
membership.
Building a strong primary care foundation requires frontline family physicians
to be engaged in planning that is clear enough to reduce variability,
but innovative enough to develop local solutions that can be implemented
effectively because they reflect the realities of local practices,
community context and the population needs being served.
The OCFP will continue to support members to address clinical
priorities through continuing professional development and mentoring
networks. And we will continue to promote the Patient's Medical Home as
the vision for primary care - a patient-centred model where
comprehensive, continuous and coordinated care is provided by an
inter-professional team led by a family physician.
We continue to listen to your comments and feedback in all
the ways that we are able. We know that family physicians want faster
access to specialists, better tools for providing care, better access to
mental health resources, and support for managing patients with chronic
pain and addictions. We will advocate for e-consults and meaningful
digital tools to support access to care, improved resources for
palliative care and medical assistance in dying, better integration and
coordination between primary and secondary care, and additional
inter-professional resources to help you to support your patients.
We hope that the messages expressed are helpful to you should
you wish to make your views known either to the OCFP or within your
primary care networks, and that they represent the important priorities
of family physicians. Please let us know about other issues you want the
OCFP to address at ocfppulse@cfpc.ca .
Links:
|
No comments:
Post a Comment