Frustration builds up among Canadian family doctors

Faced with an aging population requiring increasingly complex care, overwhelmed Canadian doctors are feeling more and more frustrated by their inability to properly serve their patients' health needs, a national survey of physicians reports.

In the survey of more than 20,000 doctors and doctors-in-training from across the country, 75 per cent reported that inadequate funding of the health care system and an under-supply of physicians and other health professionals, along with paperwork and bureaucracy, are curtailing the amount and level of care they want to provide patients.

While that attitude was expressed by all the specialties, it is perhaps most pronounced among family physicians, simply because of their number and the nature of their practice, said Calvin Gutkin, executive director and CEO of the College of Family Physicians of Canada.

Almost half of Canada's roughly 60,000 doctors are family practitioners, and it's usually the specialty seen most often by patients, he said.

"I think the frustration remains related to just the capacity within the family medicine community to address all of the needs of the population," said Dr. Gutkin, whose organization conducts the triennial survey jointly with the Canadian Medical Association and the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada.

"Physicians in most communities across the country are doing their best to try to see as many patients as they can," he said.

"But still many of them have had to ... limit the number of new patients they can take. And we have community after community with patients who are unable to access a family physician for themselves or for their families. "

Read the rest of the story here

A related story about Calgary doctors can be read in here

Burnout drives many women out of medicine

Across all health care occupations, from nurses to pharmacists to dental technicians, roughly 80 percent of the workforce is female, according to Statistics Canada.

It's becoming increasingly common as more and more women pursue medical careers, and it's the latest twist on what may be the country's most critical health care issue: the doctor shortage.

But the physician population has always been male-dominated, and this influx of women will add fuel to the doctor crisis in Canada.
Female doctors commit fewer hours and fewer years to the medical system than males, and family duties are at least one reason why.

Despite their demanding careers, women are still given the bigger proportion of child care, housekeeping and elder care, but this pressure comes with a price.

"Burnout"drives many women out of medicine altogether, and with five million Canadians currently without a family doctor, things are only getting worse.

A 2005 survey found that just 23 percent of Canadians were able to see a physician the same day they needed one, placing this country last among the six studied, including the U.S., Britain and Australia.

Canada's doctor-patient ratio is among the worst of any industrialized nation: with just 2.2 physicians per thousand people, it ranks 24th out of 28 OECD countries, which iswell below the average of three.
Among the G8 countries, Canada even ranks dead last when it comes to physician supply.

Source: CNW Group

Editor's opinion:
"A conclusion could be that husbands of women that pursue medical careers, are not contributing to the household and child care sufficiently."

York University needs to improve Medical Education

Originally designed as a feeder school for the University of Toronto, York University has managed to break away, except when it comes to medical students who are still forced to leave after completing their undergraduate degrees.

According to York University’s mission statement: “We promise excellence in research and teaching in pure, applied and professional fields.”

Since York’s founding in 1959, however, a strong emphasis has been placed on the arts and fine arts, while future doctors have moved on to other schools for further education.

Canadian universities do not have enough medical schools to keep up with the growing need for professional doctors.
Only four medical schools have been created in Canada since 1959, and only one since 1968. During this same time, the population of Canada grew 178 percent from 18 million to 32 million.

According to the Canadian Medical Association Journal, the average general practitioner in Canada works 51.4 hours per week.
From 1979 to 2003, the average Canadian workweek dropped from over 34 hours per week to around 33 hours per week.

Despite doctors working over 50 hours per week, many Canadians still have a hard time trying to find family doctors and wait times at hospitals have increased dramatically.

Meanwhile, Canada has seen a reversal of the brain drain of the mid 1990s, which saw its peak with around 1.5 percent of Canadian doctors leaving Canada to work in the United States, according to the Canadian Institute for Health Information.

Fortunately, 2006 was the third year in a row that saw a brain gain, with 238 doctors returning from abroad and only 207 leaving.
This only represents 0.05 percent of Canada’s 62,307 practicing physicians, which is not nearly enough of an increase to significantly affect hospital wait times, overworked doctors or the lack of family physicians.

The average age of doctors in Canada continues to increase, reaching 49 in 2006, with only 23 percent of doctors in Canada being under 40 and 19 percent being over 60.
The need for young doctors has never been greater, and in order to fill this need Canada needs more medical schools.

Most of the schools York competes against, including the University of Toronto, McMaster University, the University of Western Ontario and the University of Ottawa, all have quality medical schools.

York has managed to compete with and often surpass the big established programs with its business and law faculties, now it needs to do the same with a medical school.

After all, shouldn’t an interdisciplinary university strive to give their students everything that is possible, instead of simply taking the easy route and sticking to what they know best?

Source: Excalibur

Doctors of Ontario urge smokers to quit smoking in 2008

Ontario's doctors are encouraging those who smoke to make 2008 the year they quit.

Doctors and other primary care providers have been working with patients to help them develop a plan to quit smoking and can help increase the chances of success.

"Doctors understand that smoking is a serious addiction and we want to provide patients with the support they need to become smoke-free," said Dr. Ken Arnold, President-elect of the Ontario Medical Association (OMA).
"The beginning of a new year is always a good time to renew your commitment to improving your health and to make the decision to quit smoking for good."

The OMA is offering the following tips for individuals who are looking to quit smoking:

• If you smoke, avoid exposing others (especially children) to second hand smoke
• Never smoke in a car with children present
• Nicotine Replacement Therapies, like nicotine gum and the patch, will help you deal with the cravings. Keep nicotine gum with you at all times. It's available over the counter at pharmacies
• Remove ALL cigarettes and ashtrays in your home and car
• Regular exercise can help calm you down and relieve tension
• Make an appointment to see your doctor to discuss how they can help
• Make a resolution that you're going to have a healthy and smoke-free 2008

Tobacco use is the number one preventable cause of death and disease in Canada.
One in every four deaths from heart attacks and strokes in Canada is caused by smoking, and tobacco use causes about 30 percent of all cancers in Canada and more than 85 percent of lung cancers.
In Ontario and each year 16,000 patients die prematurely because of smoking.

"Make a commitment to be smoke-free in the New Year to keep you, and those around you, healthier in 2008," said Dr. Arnold.

"Everyday doctors treat patients whose health is compromised from smoking, which is why we have been advocating so strongly to protect Ontarians from tobacco use and second-hand smoke."

Editor's opinion:

"Does anyone know anyone who quit smoking with the 'help' of nicotine patches or gum?
You could get addicted to those instead and they don't solve the problem anyways.

Nicotine, the main addictive substance in tobacco products, is processed by the human body in a few hours, hence the need to light up a new one after approximately and averagely an hour.

If a smoker quits smoking cigarettes their body is in complete control.
Many smokers quit smoking cigarettes daily but they never experience any physical problems.

Even chain smokers hardly ever wake up in the middle of the night to 're-fuel', unlike a Heroin or Cocaine addict who often wake up at night to feed the addiction.

A smoker can simply spend a couple of hours watching a movie in a theater or being on an airplane, without having a cigarette and without shaking, screaming and sweating.
This shows clearly that smoking cigarettes is not at all a physical addiction!

There are always smokers who claim that they cannot sit for such long hours without cigarette while I'm sure they never even tried it or are simply lying about it, it's called addictive behavior.
This, in my opinion, only tells us that smoking is a mental addiction.

Therefore quitting smoking doesn't require products that only prevent your body to be in a state of total nicotine neutralness as a starting point to deal with the more important job: the bending of the lies your telling yourself in your mind why you shouldn't quit or just not yet.

Take it from an extreme, 2-packets-a-day, EX-smoker since 7 or 8 years (don't really remember!).
There is another painless, effortless, inexpensive and effective way to quit, since it deals with the mental and not the physical part of the addiction.

Believe it or not, it only requires to read a very amusing book, written by Allen Carr, called "The Easy Way to Stop Smoking"

It was the most valuable, yet in-expensive present I ever gave myself."

Source: CNW Group

Poor people in Canada healthier than in the U.S.

Poor and less-educated Canadians are healthier than their American counterparts, according to a Kaiser health economist based in Portland.

Although overall population health is similar in both countries, there were differences at the lowest levels of income and education, said David Feeny, senior investigator at Kaiser Permanente's Center for Health Research.
He was co-author of a study that included the largest survey comparing health in the two countries.

"Income and education are well-known predictors of health status," said Feeny.
"What was surprising, however, was the statistically significant health gap between people in the U.S. and Canada at the lowest levels of income and education. The question is, what explains this gap?"

The most obvious difference between the two countries is Canada's universal health coverage, Fenny said.

"From prenatal care through death, there is no co-pay to see a family doctor or visit the hospital," he said.

"Some people think that is probably important in the differences people observe in the less advantaged. The less advantaged in the United States often have no health insurance, or inadequate insurance."

"There is an argument, not a definitive one, that with access to routine care, people seek care earlier in the progression of a disease, instead of coming in late when you've already become a complicated case."

Source: The Columbian

Almost 80% of Canadians wary of Plastic Surgery

Almost eight out of ten Canadians would not have a face lift, droopy eyelids fixed or unwanted fat suctioned from their body, even if they could afford it.

This is the conclusion of the latest poll about plastic surgery, conducted in the wake of several high-profile cosmetic surgery deaths.

The Ipsos Reid survey for CanWest News Service and Global National found only 20 percent of 1,000 adults surveyed agreed with the statement, "If I had the means and ability, I'd have cosmetic surgery done."
Seventy-nine percent disagreed and one percent didn't know or refused to answer.)

Similar surveys in the United States suggest approval of such procedures is at an all-time high, with more than half of Americans in favour of surgical enhancement.

"I think that, with what's happened in the news in Canada, people here are a little bit more worried about plastic surgery," says Frank Lista, medical director and founder of the Plastic Surgery Clinic in Mississauga, Ontario, and past president of the Canadian Society of Aesthetic (Cosmetic) Plastic Surgery.

Last September, 32-year-old Krista Stryland, a real estate agent and mother of one, died in a hospital emergency room following a liposuction procedure performed by a family doctor who advertised as a cosmetic surgeon.

Stryland's death raised fresh alarms over untrained and unqualified doctors in Ontario performing cosmetic surgery and the increase in risky procedures being done in private "corner store" clinics.

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Lung disease COPD dramatically undiagnosed

New research from the Lung Association shows chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a group of devastating respiratory conditions including emphysema and bronchitis, is dramatically undiagnosed.

About 1.5 million Canadians are diagnosed with COPD, while another 1.6 million are living with the disease without knowing it. The 3 million Canadians living with COPD is double previous estimates.

COPD is also prevalent among younger baby boomers.
One in seven, aged 45 to 49, or 375,000 Canadians, may have the disease.

COPD sufferers lose their lung function gradually, so they may not bring any specific complaints to their doctor, said Dr. Alan Kaplan, a Richmond Hill family doctor and chairman of the Family Physician Airway Group of Canada.

"Because you lose it slowly, you don't realize it," he said.

Kaplan said prevention, namely quitting smoking, is the best way to tackle COPD. He also called for better early diagnosis in Canadians, particularly smokers, over 40 with recurring symptoms such as coughs and respiratory infections.

"We can't reverse it. We can't stop it. We can slow its progression," Kaplan said.

Source: Sun Media