Health minister acknowledges budget crunch but says maternity closure not a provincial decision
Says his ministry can help but solution is up to AHS, PCN and local doctors
Alberta Health says it did not decide that the maternity clinic in Medicine Hat would have to close but it is responsible for funding the Palliser Primary Care Network, which funded the clinic and has had no increase since 2012.
Health Minister Tyler Shandro responded to questions about the clinic’s closure in the legislature Wednesday.
“This clinic operates under a unique arrangement between the former health region and the PCN from about 15 years ago. There’s nothing else like it in the province,” said Shandro.
The Family Medicine Maternity Clinic at the Medicine Hat Regional Hospital opened 17 years ago because of a shortage of doctors doing obstetrics in southeast Alberta and a difficulty in recruiting them.
PCN used to fund 80 per cent of the clinic’s expenses but due to new budget constraints says it could no longer feasibly do so. Alberta Health Services now wants the clinic’s doctors to pay rent, utilities and staff. Those physicians say that would cost more than they currently bill for their services.
The clinic will no longer accept new patients after the end of October.
PCN has received $62 per year for each enrolled patient it serves, with no increase since 2012. It receives no funding specifically earmarked for the maternity clinics in Medicine Hat or Brooks.
“It’s true that the funding has been at the current level for some years. PCNs are under budget pressure, as is the government and the province as a whole,” said Steve Buick, a spokesperson for Alberta health.
Buick says, however, that the government has nothing to do with the decision to close the maternity clinic.
“This is the PCN’s own decision. They have a certain arrangement with AHS, which AHS inherited from the previous health region,” said Buick. “Each of the parties, AHS and the PCN, has a certain investment in this clinic; each of them has financial pressures; each of them naturally is trying to reduce its cost.”
Shandro says it is up to PCN, AHS and the maternity clinic physicians to negotiate a solution.
“My department is also willing to be part of a solution — for example, by transitioning the AHS clinical stipend paid to this group of doctors to an ARP, if that would help,” said Shandro. “But let’s be clear — this is an arrangement provided to no other doctors in Alberta. In other communities, family doctors provide maternity care through a range of funding and practice models.”
The hospital will continue to do deliveries but it would be up to physicians in their family practice to provide the services that women received at the clinic, though local physicians say they are now left with liability issues beyond 22 weeks of pregnancy.