Family doctor in North Bay, Ont., says family medicine is in crisis

A family doctor in North Bay, Ont., says family medicine is in crisisand several changes are needed to ensure more medical students choose to become family physicians.

"Family medicine clinical practice is just not as attractive as we need it to be to have a sustainable health-care system," said Dr. Taylor Lougheed.

According to the Ontario College of Family Physicians, 2.3 million Ontariansare without a family doctor. That number is expected to increase to 4.4 million by 2026.

Across the province, there are 108 unfilled medicine spots for residency placements, including 11 at NOSM University, in northern Ontario.

Lougheed said a few things make family medicine less attractive to students deciding which specialty to pursue.

Family physicians spend an increasing amount of time on administrative work, managing their practices, he said.

"We're hearing that some doctors are spending upwards of 19 hours a week doing admin tasks, sending referralsand filling out insurance company forms."

Another issue, said Lougheed, is family physicians aren't compensated as well as specialists, especially when the overhead of managing a practice is taken into account.

"Their gross income is used to cover overhead, help pay for staff, pay for supplies, and the math isn't working out."

Lougheed said many new doctors graduate from medical school with significant student debt and are considering other specialities that pay more.

In the 2024Ontario budget, the province set aside $9 million to plan for a new medical school at Toronto's York Universitythat would be dedicated to training family doctors.

Lougheed said he welcomes the initiative, but there are already openings for family medicine residencies that are going unfilled.

To attract more family doctors, he said,a centralized referral system would help relieve some of the administrative burden faced by family doctors.

He said the compensation issue also has to be addressed.

Not addressing the family doctor shortage puts a strain on the entire health-care system, Lougheed said.

"There are ripple effects across the entire system and we're seeing that now with increased wait times and worse outcomes."