The Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, appeals to the sense of responsibility of doctors to continue to care for patients via the First Line Access Window (GAP), despite his decision to put an end to the annual fee of $120 in force for two years. The FMOQ replies that access risks decreasing.
• Read also – “The GAP is here to stay”: Christian Dubé wants to renegotiate the agreement with general practitioners
The Minister of Health announced to the Federation of General Practitioners of Quebec (FMOQ) the end of the agreement which grants a lump sum to Family Medicine Groups (GMF) to take care of an orphan patient.
Some 900,000 Quebecers have been registered with a GMF over the past two years. To obtain an appointment, they had to contact the GAP, where they were directed to the relevant health professional.
The amount was therefore granted for the treatment, the doctors then being paid according to the usual rates at the time of the visit.
But the agreement expires on May 31 and Christian Dubé refuses to renew it before having obtained data on the number of clinic visits actually granted thanks to this formula.
“There will not be more money if there is not more access,” says Minister Dubé.
According to a government source, only half of the 900,000 patients registered over the past two years have seen a doctor to date. To which the FMOQ responds that patients were able to see a doctor several times, according to their needs, and that 99% of the time slots made available were filled.
The question will be part of the renewal of the general agreement that Quebec must renegotiate periodically with the FMOQ.
In the meantime, the Minister of Health is asking doctors to continue seeing registered patients, even without additional remuneration. “There is a professional responsibility,” argues Christian Dubé.
“GAP is here to stay,” he proclaimed several times on Thursday.
Supported
However, starting next month, Bill 11 will allow the minister to know the appointments granted by medical clinics, present and past. Christian Dubé will therefore be able to obtain an answer to his questions even before the end of the current agreement with the FMOQ, on May 31.
For its part, the doctors’ federation emphasizes that it was open to maintaining the current approach until a new agreement is concluded.
According to our information, the agreement has to date cost around $100 million per year, an amount resulting from the agreement concluded between family doctors and the Couillard government at the time.
The FMOQ stunned
In an interview, the president of the FMOQ said he was “stunned and stunned” by Minister Christian Dubé’s “unilateral” announcement.
Thanks to this agreement, nearly a million orphan patients now have access to a doctor, he argues, while waiting to review the method of remuneration to implement an approach focused on care, rather than payment. to the act.
But above all, the lump sum allowed clinics to attract doctors who work in hospitals or who were retired, in addition to hiring nurses to provide care.
Despite nearly a hundred fewer doctors than in 2022, the first line managed to see more patients, he emphasizes.
“We risk losing accessibility for the population,” deplores the Dr Amyot. There is a risk of layoffs of staff who had been hired in the GMFs, nurses who will be laid off in the GMFs… maybe that’s what he wants.”