REGINA — The Government of Saskatchewan has admitted to challenges regarding hours of operation at Regina’s Urgent Care Centre (UCC).
Since March, the UCC has reduced its hours eight times and also closed last Sunday.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Saskatchewan Health Minister Jeremy Cockrill said the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) has had difficulties with the UCC operations.
“[It] really comes down to physician availability and physician capacity,” he noted.
Regina’s UCC operations primarily employ emergency physicians and family physicians, who have other responsibilities besides the centre.
“They may have partners in their practice who are exploring other options, have health issues, family issues, etc,” said Dr. Alan Beggs, deputy chief medical officer with the SHA, in a recent interview.
Cockrill said the government will review physician contracts, but acknowledged that addressing the challenges facing UCCs will require more than that.
“It also comes down to making sure that we’re training as many physicians as we can in the province.”
Recently, the province has expanded family medicine residency seats across the province.
Additionally, the University of Saskatchewan introduced a program in fall 2025 to train physician assistants.
Cockrill also alluded to the government hopefully introducing specific training opportunities for urgent care services.
“We can attract new physicians into that space, you know, early in their career.”
In terms of recruitment, Cockrill said the province has seen good interest from physicians in the U.K. and Ireland.
A recruitment agency working on the government’s behalf will visit those areas in both the spring and fall.
As for other UCC’s opening in the future, including Saskatoon, Cockrill is confident they’ll see good numbers staffing-wise.
“I’m pretty confident that we’ll get to a good spot there.”
