Canadian family doctors are better than average when it comes to being accessible to their patients but slower to adopt the use of technology to communicate, a recent study says.

The New Brunswick Medical Society is less than halfway to its target of having 500 doctors enrolled in its electronic medical records system in its first year of operation.

Last month, controversy arose when a medical centre refused to release patients' records to doctors who had switched clinics. The province intervened, but the problem created some discussion over how medical records are kept, and whether Saskatchewan's system could be made more efficient.