‘We still desperately need doctors’
Physician recruitment gets a boost as 10 Queen’s medical students visit
With a shortage of doctors across Canada, and Cambridge short about 20 doctors, the resumption of the Rural Ontario Medical Program is coming at a critical point.
The five-day program, from May 29 to June 2, brings 10 first-year medical students to the city to receive hands-on experience with doctors and specialists and to get an introduction to the community. It has been a successful tool in the past to recruit doctors. Two 2017 participants are now doctors in Cambridge.
It is the first time the program — this time with Queen’s University students — has run since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Doctors4Cambridge has recruited more than 120 family physicians to the city since 1999, said recruitment co-ordinator Donna Gravelle in a presentation to city council on May 9. The rural medical program is one tool to bring in doctors.
Currently, 88 full-time primary care physicians are practising in the city; based on population, it should have 108, according to the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care.
Since January 2020, 12 physicians have left their practice and four have not been replaced, leaving “orphaned patients,” Gravelle said. As well, three physicians will be leaving their Cambridge practices in 2023, and three others could retire.
Physicians are leaving for a variety of reasons: retirement, early and unexpected retirements, a switch from family medicine to another area of medicine, doctors leaving medicine altogether, and, in one case, she said a new physician faced racism in the community.
Cambridge has been considered “high needs” for physicians, since before the pandemic Gravelle added.
“We still desperately need doctors,” Gravelle said.
“Everyone is suffering and there’s more recruitment efforts going on in towns and cities that there ever was before. It has certainly increased the competition.”
The rural medical program will help boost Cambridge’s profile in the competition with other municipalities for doctors, Gravelle said. In the beginning, she admits, Cambridge was not at the top of the list for the program.
“Now it’s No. 1, because medical students who’ve been here before say that they have a really wonderful week here, a really immersive experience. So it’s definitely one of the top ones for students to pick now to do their one-week rotation.”
The week is not all work for the students: there’s a tour of Langdon Hall and the Gaslight District, canoeing the Grand River with the Ancient Mariners, and a downtown scavenger hunt. But the students will shadow family physicians and a Cambridge Memorial Hospital specialist, and participate in a suturing clinic.
The city does a good job of selling itself to potential doctors, Gravelle said.
“I think the reason we do is because of what we have to offer: the size of our community; the fact we only have one hospital, so the family doctors get to know the specialists; it’s a brand-new hospital,” Gravelle said.
“One thing I know a lot of doctors coming from out of province are looking for is higher education for their children. So being so close to Conestoga and all the universities is very much a selling feature, and also being close to Toronto and the 401. So definitely, I think we have a lot of advantages over other communities.”
‘‘ Everyone is suffering and there’s more recruitment efforts going on in towns and cities that there ever was before.
DONNA GRAVELLE RECRUITMENT CO-ORDINATOR