Following months of questions about the future for primary care and family doctors in Nova Scotia, the Liberals have revealed a plan that boosts spending and adds residency positions.
Thursday’s budget adds another $6 million to primary care in the province. The health department said the money will go towards new staff positions but said it can’t give an estimate of how many people it will hire because different clinics will require different staff additions.
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The new staff could cover a range of health-care providers, from nurse practitioners to dietitians. The department said who is hired will depend on the needs of individual communities and what communities want.
The $6 million is on top of $3.6 million announced last year. The smaller sum led to 23 new nurses being hired for family practices across the province last week. The province says those nurses will give 14,000 more Nova Scotians access to primary care.
“This improves access to family doctors, nurses, and other primary-care providers for thousands more Nova Scotians,” Finance Minister Randy Delorey told the legislature.
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After promising a doctor for every Nova Scotian in the last election, Premier Stephen McNeil’s government has been dogged by stories about people going without, and Statistics Canada information showing that as many as 91,800 people over the age of 12 don’t have a regular health-care provider.
In early April, the health authority said 27,757 Nova Scotians were on a wait list for a family doctor.
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Liberals creating more spaces for family medicine residents
According to the budget, another $2.4 million will go towards creating 20 new spaces for family practice residents.
Ten of those spaces will go towards new positions in family medicine at Dalhousie University. Another 10 will be created in a “new practice-ready assessment program” for internationally-trained doctors.
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Adding the spaces bring the total family medicine spaces in the province to more than 50, according to Delorey. Health department staff said on average, 75 per cent of family practice residents stay in Nova Scotia when they’re done their residency.
Progressive Conservatives say measures don’t go far enough
Yesterday, Doctors Nova Scotia told a committee of the legislature that the province’s own plans require it to hire 100 new doctors every year for the next decade. That includes family physicians and specialists.
But Tory Leader Jamie Baillie said those numbers show the initiatives announced in the budget don’t cut it.
“That’s tinkering when there’s a crisis in family doctors,” Baillie said.
The department said more information about the specifics and timelines for the spending is still to come.
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