The question of collaboration within the health care system was brought up again by the Prime Minister in an interview with CBCNews Network, Thursday morning. He did this in response to a question about the shortage of health care workers.
<q data-attributes="{"lang":{"value":"fr","label":"Français"},"value":{"html":"Nous avons autant de médecins per capita than other provinces. We may even be the province with the most per capita. We have two systems, Vitalité and Horizon, which can work together more closely and coordinate their activities”,”text”:”We have as many physicians per capita as other provinces. We may even be the province with the most per capita. We have two systems, Vitality and Horizon, which can work together more closely and coordinate their activities”}}”>We have so many doctors per capita than other provinces. We may even be the province with the most per capita. We have two systems, Vitality and Horizon, which can work together more closely and coordinate their activitieshe said.
This is not his first call for collaboration. The difference this time is that he has more control than ever over the health care system since he dismissed the boards of directors of the two boards and appointed trustees.
Does New Brunswick really have more doctors?
According to the most recent data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information, there were 242 doctors per 100,000 people in New Brunswick in 2020. That’s slightly more than the national average, which was 242.
Note, however, that a few other provinces had more physicians per 100,000 people than New Brunswick: Newfoundland (262), Nova Scotia (278), Quebec (257), Alberta (252) and British Columbia (254).
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Blaine Higgs also noted during this interview that some hospitals – often within the same health network – work too much in isolation for his liking.
« What is missing is cooperation. You can have two hospitals near each other. Nowhere are two hospitals more closely associated than in Fredericton, for example. There are two hospitals within a 20 minute drive of each other (in Fredericton and Oromocto). In Saint-Jean, they are five or ten minutes away, in Moncton they are five minutes away. But they do not coordinate their activities. »
The Prime Minister gave the example of a young girl who waited for almost 20 hours in an emergency room with a broken wrist. She then went to another hospital on the other side of the street
and was processed in two hours.
He was referring to an incident that happened last April that was reported by English-language media. The girl in question waited nearly 20 hours in the emergency room of the CHU Dumont, according to her mother.
Our health services must be coordinated. You have to take a step back, look at the process and manage the use of resources and equipment and the patients to ensure that you are responding to their patients quickly. Today we don’t do that
Blaine Higgs added Thursday in an interview with CBCNews Network.
I think Blaine Higgs is looking for lice
Liberal MP Jean-Claude D’Amours on July 29, 2020.
Photo : Radio-Canada
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The official opposition’s critic for health issues, Jean-Claude D’Amours, questions the sincerity of the Prime Minister’s remarks.
I think Blaine Higgs is looking for lice, he’s looking for reasons to find a way to destroy the healthcare system like we’re used to having it.
he said in an interview with Radio-Canada Acadie.
This Liberal MP notes that Blaine Higgs has been in power since November 2018 and therefore had almost four years to make the changes he wanted to the health care system.
« He still had the last four years to do things. He failed him and his government, he failed the health care system. He let New Brunswickers down on that level. »
Jean-Claude D’Amours also notes that the two health networks and the hospitals regularly work together. He says they did this during the pandemic and continue to do so now, as various services are temporarily closed across the province.
One can think in particular of the recent interruption of pediatric and obstetrics services at the Edmundston Regional Hospital.
When the suspension was announced on July 22, Vitalité Health Network indicated that patients requiring pediatric consultation would be transferred to the Dr. Everett Chalmers Regional Hospital in Fredericton, which is managed by the Horizon Health Network.
We hope that the system can return to each of our hospitals as it was before. But currently, we can see that the system is working. Premier Higgs is looking for a way, I’m convinced, to do away with the boards as we know them now
said Jean-Claude D’Amours.
Radio-Canada Acadie asked Vitalité Health Network for a reaction on Thursday. Its director of communications, Jean-René Noël, declined our request. He referred us to the Minister of Health and the Prime Minister.
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