REGINA — With time ticking down, Opposition New Democrats are demanding Health Minister Jeremy Cockrill come up with a plan by Monday at 1 p.m. to keep open the Gardens Community Health Centre in Regina.
The clinic is set to close at the end of the month. NDP Health Critic Meara Conway said at a news conference Friday that an estimated 5,000 patients will lose their family doctor if nothing is done.
“This will be a huge blow to our community and a huge blow to the thousands of families that rely on this clinic,” Conway said. “The Sask Party needs to absolutely do everything in its power to keep this clinic from shutting its doors. That's why I'm calling on the Sask Party Health Minister Jeremy Cockrill to present his plan by Monday at 1 p.m. to save this clinic and the estimated 5,000 people that rely on it.”
Conway said the government is “well positioned to take action,” as it budgeted $4.3 million for the clinic and $3 million annually beginning in 2019. “That's an estimated minimum of $20 million dollars of provincial funding that has gone into this clinic and I understand they were also in receipt of federal money as well.”
Conway noted that patients were notified by letter in September that the clinic would be closing due to an inability to recruit physicians to replace the doctors who were retiring. A job posting for two family physician positions at the clinic has sat on SaskJobs for nearly 11 months, she said.
Conway blamed the government for “driving doctors and nurses out of the province.”
“We need a plan immediately to keep this clinic open. Recall that in the last election this government made a promise that by 2028 all people of Saskatchewan would have access to primary care — a family doctor. We are moving in the wrong direction.”
As for how Saskatchewan recruits and retains family physicians, Conway said what she was hearing from family physicians is that the remunerations approach needs to change.
She suggested looking into how to turn this particular clinic into a community clinic where doctors are on a salary, instead of a fee-for-service model.
“We have put so many public so much public money into this clinic. It is a wonderful location. It has been doing good work in terms of its focus on geriatric care seniors but unfortunately the two leading physicians there are retiring much like many physicians across Saskatchewan and they weren't able to recruit physicians. Many of them have left the province. So it is incumbent on the health minister to step in and come up with a plan. This place cannot just shutter its doors.”
In a statement, the Saskatchewan Health Authority confirmed the Gardens Community Health Centre will be permanently closing Nov. 30.
“While the SHA has partnered with this privately-run clinic to support allied health programming, this clinic and its physicians ultimately operates independent of the SHA," the statement read.
"The SHA appreciates and thanks the physicians for serving their community all these years.”
The SHA states it is “committed to further supporting patients impacted by the closure of the private medical clinic, including working with the health centre’s physicians to explore their ability to support patient referrals, prescription refills and ongoing care. The SHA will also be continuing SHA-delivered patient services, including maintaining our staff complement – which includes one full-time registered nurse, one part-time pharmacist and a paramedic who is assigned based on need. These staff are now integrated into the South Network in Regina and are working hard to support transitions to new primary care providers. Once the clinic is closed, they will continue their work out of the South Network in collaboration with our chronic disease teams.”
The SHA adds it is currently developing plans on where service providers currently based at the Gardens Community Health Centre will be located in the future, and will communicate these plans to patients and staff when they are finalized.
