Six months ago, my daughter Alice had major back surgery. Three vertebrae were fused. If nothing had been done, his vertebrae would have slipped on top of each other, causing incontinence problems or, even worse, paralysis of the lower limbs.
Even though his health problem was serious, it was not a doctor who sounded the alarm. It’s his chiropractor. Worried that her pain was continuing, she recommended seeing a doctor. After a consultation at a walk-in clinic, Alice had a spinal x-ray.
Then no more news in the following weeks. At the clinic, we were told that the doctor had fallen behind on his paperwork. The chiropractor then asked if she could look at the x-ray in my daughter’s file herself.
You can see the two vertebrae sliding past each other at the bottom of Alice’s spine, less than three months before the operation. It was this image that alerted the chiropractor.
Image taken from the PB Radiology report
After seeing the radiology report, she told us that Alice needed to see an orthopedist urgently. Three months after the first consultation with a specialist at Shriners Hospital, she was on the operating table. Nine hours of surgery followed by several months of rehabilitation.
- Listen to the interview with journalist Éric-Yvan Lemay on Richard Martineau’s show via QUB:
Pharmacist to the rescue
Why am I telling you this story? Because my family has not had a doctor since December 2020. The one who took care of us until then chose to go and practice in another region. We have therefore been orphaned by a doctor for 1180 days now. There is no one who provides medical care for my wife, our four children and myself.
Like us, 2.3 million people in Quebec live without this safety net with all the consequences that entails. For example, we had to adjust my daughter’s medication for other health problems with the pharmacist. No one else ensures that the prescribed dose continues to be the right one, even if it grows.
I could have turned to the private sector, you might say, but I don’t do it out of principle. I come from a modest background and I believe that money should not give you privileged access to a doctor. Especially since the taxes that I pay, along with all Quebec taxpayers, are used to pay for a good part of the expensive training of doctors. Quebec pays more than $40,000 per year for each doctoral student*.
I don’t blame them for choosing the private sector. For patients, this is sometimes the only way to receive care. For some doctors, this is the solution to getting their heads above water. Half of doctors are overwhelmed, according to a recent survey by the College of Family Physicians of Canada.
However, the lack of medical monitoring only makes the problem worse. In Alberta, monitoring of diabetic patients by a family doctor reduced avoidable emergency room visits by 18%**.
- Listen to the interview with Dr. Simon-Pierre Landry, family doctor in Mont-Tremblant on Alexandre Dubé’s microphone via
:
Clean waiting list
However, I have not given up hope that my family will eventually get a doctor. Last January, I received a call. A nice lady checking to see if the information in my oldest boy’s file was up to date. As he is in great shape, I took the opportunity to talk to him about Alice, who in my opinion needed a doctor more quickly.
The lady agreed that she was given priority, moving her from rank E (in good health) to rank B (person for whom registration with a doctor is urgent). And since then, nothing. A few days later, I received another call to update the data of another of my children.
The author of these lines with his daughter, Alice, two days after surgery to fuse three of her vertebrae.
PHOTO PROVIDED BY Lysanne Tremblay
These calls gave the impression that people registered with the Family Medicine Access Center (GAMF) were being visited to ensure that they were not dead. At the ministry, they talk to me more about an “administrative purge” to check that the people on the list were still waiting. Next time I hope I get called for something other than a cleaning on the list.
*Study of appropriations 2022-2023, Ministry of Health and Social Services
**College of Family Physicians of Canada. Family doctors: Pivotal of Canada’s health care system.