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Petition
Presented April 7, 2008
To improve efforts to recruit and retain general
practitioners.
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MR. SPEAKER: The
hon. the Member for Port de Grave.
MR. BUTLER: Thank
you very much, Mr. Speaker.
I want to present another
petition which has been already read in the House and is
the same prayer of the petition with regard to doctor
shortages.
I know we are getting
close to Budget time, so I will try to get my last
couple of petitions in and hopefully the Minister of
Health – and I am sure we are going to hear good news
when the Budget comes down about the retention of
doctors throughout this Province of Newfoundland and
Labrador.
Mr. Speaker, today I
speak with reference to the situation that we find
ourselves in, in the Conception Bay North area - and I
am sure the same can be said throughout this Province -
where there is a shortage of general practitioners. I
know, in our area there is quite a shortage. A lot of
people had to travel to St. John’s when their own
general practitioners moved to this area for various
reasons, and they find themselves now in a difficult
position where they don’t have a general practitioner,
where the reports and tests that they have done, either
at St. Clare’s or the Health Sciences, can be sent to.
It is very disturbing to them.
Not only that, Mr.
Speaker, but when there is a shortage of doctors or
someone doesn’t have a doctor at all, all too often
the workload on the general practitioners that we do
have in our areas is tremendous, and the people
automatically then go to the emergency units at our
hospitals. The same can be said at the Carbonear General
Hospital, and we have also heard it referenced on the
open line shows and in the media, that the same thing is
happening here in the city. That is understandable. When
people have a problem, regardless of how minor it is, if
they can’t reach their general practitioner or if they
don’t have one, they go to the hospital and try to be
dealt with in the emergency unit.
Mr. Speaker, hopefully we
will see something come down in this Budget that will
help us to get new doctors and to retain the ones that
we have. We heard it in the media recently, about the
Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association, the
concerns being expressed by the doctors. We brought up a
situation here to the hon. House with regard to
audiologists. We know there are audiologists at the
Janeway Hospital, but I know there are three vacancies
there, and hopefully this year they will be taken care
of and then the testing has to be done for some of our
young people who are finding it difficult in the
schools, so they can be assessed and taken care of.
Mr. Speaker, on behalf of
those who signed the petition, I ask that government try
and come up with a plan where we can attract more
doctors to our Province and also retain the positions
that we have filled at the present time.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. |
