The Collège des médecins du Québec (CMQ) believes that Bill 68, aimed at reducing the administrative burden on physicians, must go “even further.” The professional order states that the requirement for a patient to obtain a prescription from a physician to access services insured by the RAMQ must be removed if the patient has already been assessed by another health professional who is able to determine the need for care or a device.
The legislative text, which was tabled last May by the Minister of Labour, Jean Boulet, will be the subject of consultations starting this Tuesday, at the National Assembly. Among other things, it aims to prohibit private insurers from requiring that a person see a doctor to be reimbursed for technical aids, such as an orthosis, or the services of a professional, such as a massage therapist.
This will notably make it possible to “reduce the administrative burden on doctors regarding the forms to be completed for private insurers”, the College rejoices in a memorandum which will be presented to parliamentarians during the day.
However, this professional order states that the government must go “even further in this process of load shedding, by also attacking the services covered by the public system”.
The College gives the example of medical imaging tests prescribed by podiatrists, which are not currently reimbursed by the RAMQ. This forces these foot specialists “to refer their patients without insurance to a doctor so that the latter can prescribe the test, even though these patients have already been assessed by a competent health professional authorized to make this prescription,” deplores the CMQ.
The order states that this approach is “not efficient” from the point of view of providing care. “It also causes delays, as well as additional costs, and it harms access to care, while other patients could benefit from this time slot of the doctor.”
Approximately 24% of the workload of family doctors is devoted each week to administrative work, according to the results of a survey conducted two years ago by the Fédération des médecins omnipraticiens du Québec among 2,248 of its members.
In order to reduce the paperwork for doctors, Bill 68 would ensure that employers would no longer have the right to require a doctor’s note for short-term absences, such as those due to the flu or an accident.
The “weight of bureaucracy”
In its brief, the Collège des médecins du Québec also recommends the establishment of a permanent committee, in order to “regularly analyze the burden of bureaucracy that administrative measures impose on the daily lives of doctors.”
This group would be composed of representatives from the Ministry of Health and Social Services, the CMQ, as well as other stakeholders in the health sector, explains the professional order.
This committee would also have the mandate to examine the content of the various forms (insurance, etc.) that doctors have to fill out, “in order to ensure their relevance.”
Further details will follow.