Greater Sudbury Northern Life
The Ontario Medical Association is speaking out about the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care delaying the addition of 50 family health teams for one year while opening three new nurse practitioner clinics.
The clinics will operate in northwest Ontario, Sault Ste. Marie and Erie-St. Clair.
President Tom Arnold said in a press release that nurse practitioner clinics serve low numbers of patients and haven't been proven to provide "high quality, cost-effective care."
Arnold said statistics show a family health team (a multi-disciplinary team of doctors, nurse practitioners, nurses and other professionals) can care for 10 times the number of patients as a nurse practitioner clinic.
For example, he said, the nurse practitioner clinic in Sudbury has taken on 1,900 patients with a staff of 3.5 nurse practitioners. In comparison, the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care has a target 2.8 million patients in 150 family health teams, meaning each team would have 19,000 patients.
The Sudbury clinic, which opened in 2007, was the first of its kind in the province. "You're cutting edge," Premier Dalton McGuinty told nurse practitioners Roberta Heale and Marilyn Butcher when he dropped in last April. "You're laying the groundwork for 25 more."
Did you know?
Nurse practitioners are able to treat common illnesses and injuries, write certain
prescriptions and order certain lab tests, X-rays and other diagnostic tests.
Nurse practitioner clinics will focus on chronic disease management, health promotion and disease prevention along with other community-based health care organizations such as public health units. Source ~ Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care
