The CAQ wants to build private “mini-hospitals”

(Montreal) The Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) wants to increase the place of the private sector in health by launching a call for projects to build two new private medical centers halfway between a family medicine group (FMG) and a hospital to treat minor cases that do not need to go to the emergency room.

Hugo Pilon Larose
The Press

These new centers, qualified Saturday as private “mini-hospitals”, would be located in Montreal and Quebec. There would be a family medicine group (GMF) open seven days a week, 24-hour emergencies that can treat minor problems that do not require hospitalization and operating rooms for day surgeries, among others. The services offered would be covered by the Régie de l’assurance maladie du Québec (RAMQ).

CAQ leader François Legault made the announcement on Saturday in eastern Montreal, where his party wants to make gains on October 3. The caquistes are counting on their candidate Karine Boivin-Roy, among others, to dislodge the Liberals from the riding of Anjou–Louis-Riel.

Thus, if the CAQ forms the next government on October 3, a call for projects would be launched and these two new private centers could welcome their first patients in 2025. Their construction would cost 35 million each, foresees the party of François Legault. This amount would be entirely financed by the private sector, it was specified.

However, these new “mini-hospitals” would have access to the same funding model as that governing the FMGs, which are also private. “The Ministry of Health and Social Services, which has an agreement with the private owners of FMGs to meet part of their fixed costs”, explained Saturday the CAQ candidate in the riding of La Prairie and Minister of Health, Christian Dube.

In a press briefing, Mr. Dubé did not rule out that these new medical centers could accommodate two types of clientele: those paying with the “sun card”, that is to say the medical interventions supported by the RAMQ , and those who would personally pay for entirely private health care.

But “this is not at all our objective”, specified the Minister of Health. ” [Notre objectif], he said, is to have as much public support as possible. »

“When we go to appeal [de projets], we will say here is the number of surgeries that we want to have in the public. There will be very clear scales,” said Mr. Dubé.

Objective: unload emergencies

By building these two new centers during a potential second term (there could eventually be “a dozen”, specified the CAQ, if the model proves its effectiveness), François Legault promises to reduce the waiting time to emergencies.

“Hospital emergency rooms are still too often the main point of entry for patients, because they have no other choice. They need care, but their state of health does not necessarily require access to technical platforms and services as specialized as those of hospitals, which contributes to bogging down the network, ”explains the party.

“In order for the patient to obtain the right care at the right time, from the right person, as provided for in the Health Plan, there is sometimes a lack of a type of establishment halfway between the GMF and the hospital, for patients who have need care, but not necessarily in the emergency room. […] These local services, developed and managed by the private sector, will reduce the pressure on hospitals,” it added.

On Friday, Christian Dubé did not give a precise target for the reduction in waiting times in the emergency room that he is aiming for. “If we are able to remove as many of the [cas mineurs] who come to the emergency room and who shouldn’t be there [en les prenant en charge] either in FMGs or in [ces nouveaux centres privés], we would reduce the traffic in our emergencies by 30 to 40%. That’s huge! “, he pleaded.

And how long will Quebecers have to wait on average in these private “mini-hospitals”? “In the call [de projets] what we’re going to do, we’re going to tell them you have to have enough doctors, nurses and professionals to give us wait times that we think are reasonable,” he said.

Right turn

For the parliamentary leader of Québec solidaire, this is another demonstration of the “turn to the right” of the Coalition avenir Québec, which would be inspired by Éric Duhaime and his Conservative Party. “I think François Legault is influenced by Éric Duhaime. It’s true in the LNG Quebec file, we see that François Legault’s favorite ministers are working behind the scenes to revive this project. And this is also true in health, ”he denounced.

He cites the example of private health nursing agencies, and private CHSLDs, which have both “failed” in the task in recent years, recent examples of the fact that the private sector is harmful to the health network.