According to recent estimates, one in six Saskatchewan residents are currently without a regular family doctor.
Some are concerned that with a shortage of this magnitude, more practices appear to be closing as doctors retire and no successors step in to take over.
The average age of physicians registered with the College of Physicians and Surgeons in Saskatchewan is on the rise, according to data from annual reports. The ideal pace for a physician is to maintain approximately 1,400 patients, but most currently have a patient list of about 2,500 to 3,000, according to Muller. Some are juggling twice that, he added.“Your typical seven-minute consultations are now becoming rare. You’re spending longer time with your patients, working later or seeing less patients per day.”
Just 10 per cent of the most recent graduating class of medical students at the University of Saskatchewan chose to specialize in family medicine in the province, he pointed out. Additionally, according to a survey in December of family physician residents at the University of Alberta, less than 40 per cent intended to take on new patients in the first five years of their practice.
“It’s trying to solve the problem at the end of the whole thing, instead of trying to go upstream and try and fix the cause of the problem.”
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