Our journalists also experience all sorts of problems and ups and downs in their daily lives. They give us here their personal testimonies in which many of our readers will recognize themselves.
From now on, orphan patients must go through a one-stop access point to see a family doctor. But you have to be patient: I had to stay on the phone for 2.5 hours on Monday before getting an appointment, when a computer problem accentuated the already discouraging waiting times.
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Like more than 643,000 Quebecers, I am still without a family doctor. To put things into perspective, when I signed up for the Family Doctor Access Window (GAMF) six years ago, Gaétan Barrette was still Minister of Health.
Faced with the failures of this first system, his successor, Christian Dubé, then created the first line access window (GAP). With a wave of a magic wand, 500,000 Quebecers were registered with a family medicine group.
Problem fixed!
Finally, until the day you really need to see a doctor.
Telephone table tennis
As a good citizen, I therefore called the GAP on Monday, as requested by the government. After 1h20 of waiting on sweet music, an attendant finally answers me. “Hello, we are going to update your GAMF file”.
HM okay. Name, address, nearest pharmacy.
And now I’m putting you back on hold to talk to a nurse. It should take about 45 minutes!
Same thing then with the nurse who fills out my health form.
I think I finally see the light at the end of the tunnel…
Sir, I’m putting you on hold again to make an appointment with an administrative assistant!
In the meantime, you can imagine that I tried to turn to the online service, as the recorded voice has been advising me for 2 hours now. Result: call the GAP! Well, thanks for the tip.
Another 30 minutes and I was finally able to get an appointment with a doctor.
Not lucky, but…
Of course, the troubles experienced by Rendez-vous santé Québec could have created an influx of calls to the GAP on Monday, when the site was unusable due to a problem with the Captcha identification system.
“You’re not lucky, it usually takes 1 hour,” the administrative assistant told me when I made my appointment. All the same!
Personally, my job allows me to wait on the phone while working (and moreover, thank you to the three GAP employees, whose professionalism was exemplary).
But how could a teacher, for example, have the luxury of wasting an hour or more in the hope of getting a doctor’s appointment?
I have to say it: when I call a dentist, a chiropractor or a physio, they answer quickly!
Well, that’s not all, now I have to register on SAAQclic.