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28 - The Oakville Beaver Weekend, Saturday November 24, 2007 www.oakvillebeaver.com No cure on horizon for doctor shortage SPECIAL REPORT PART TWO OF TWO This Metroland West Media Group investigative report was produced by reporters, photographers and editors from The Oakville Beaver, The Burlington Post, The Milton Canadian Champion, Niagara This Week, The Hamilton Spectator, The Record of Waterloo Region, and The Guelph Mercury. P atients today commute to doctors half the GTA away. They call up friends of friends hoping to hit on a doctor taking new patients. They use walk-in clinics or go to hospitals.They make endless phone calls and consult the web. DOC+OR IN THE HOUSE? Many go through the angst of a face-to-face interview with a physician taking patients, or fill out questionnaires. Some even withhold medical information from prospective doctors, in case they are refused. These are the realities that patients searching for a family doctor still face five years into a shortage that the Ontario Medical Association says is only getting worse. Doctors, too, cope with problems, including overwhelming patient loads. As they approach retirement, some doctors are scaling back duties in favour of more balanced lives. Others are returning to Canada from abroad as their twilight years approach, to spend more time with families still based here. The average age of an Ontario family doctor is 49.5. And nearly a third of family physicians are female, meaning many doctors are also working fewer hours in order to raise families. "For a while yet, we're going to have to face declining numbers," says Dr. Jeffrey Turnbull, president of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario. "You've got a long time where the problem is going to get worse before you see significant increase in the number of physicians." All these forces have an impact on how patients get daily, basic care, and how doctors make do. Sometimes, a solution creates a brand-new problem. A number of physicians, for example, have opted out of taking hospital privileges over the last few years. To make time to see more patients in the office, many have abandoned the traditional role of attending to their own patients in hospital when the patients go for surgery or other care. This, in turn, has created what hospitals call "orphan patients," people admitted and initially cared for by surgeons or other specialists, but who still need an attending physician for inpatient care. Now, a new breed of doctor called a "hospitalist" looks after them. In Oakville, nine hospitalists now see between 175 and 195 patients a day. In Milton, one hospitalist attends to a daily patient list of up to 25. In Ontario, 1 million adults and 130,000 children don't have a family doctor. The OMA says the province needs 1,000 general practitioners now. About 200,000 patients without a doctor live in the Milton to Niagara area covered by Metroland West Media Group's investigation into family care. IS THERE A LIESA KORTMANN / OAKVILLE BEAVER YOUR FINGERS CAN'T DO ALL WALKING: Searching the phone book for a new doctor can prove fruitless if all the listed doctors aren't accepting any new patients.. How to find a family doctor? T he search for a family doctor can be an exhaustive and repetitive process. There's no central number to call or place to submit your name if you're without a doctor in Oakville. Searching the terms "need a doctor" and "find a doctor" fails to turn up useful links on the Ministry of Health and LongTerm Care's website. There's no registry to let you know how many other people are ahead of you on waiting lists, because each doctor has their own individual list. When looking for a doctor, you're on your own. Here is how to navigate your way through the search. · Go online: The College of Physicians DOC+OR IN THE HOUSE? and Surgeons of Ontario website (www.cpso.on.ca) provides a list of doctors accepting new patients in a requested city. Click on "Doctor Search" and you'll find there are different ways to localize your search. A warning though, the site is known for not always being up to date. In Halton, visit the region's website at www.physicianopportunities.ca. On the home page, click on the 'New Physicians IS THERE A Accepting Patients' link on the left-hand side. Officials say they try to update it as frequently as possible. · Call around: It takes time, but there's nothing wrong with working your way through the phone book. Good timing might catch you a break. · Waiting lists: Since they're all administered individually and differently, to cover all of your bases, it's best to get your name on a few. · Ask around: Talk to family, friends and co-workers to see if anyone has a doctor accepting patients. Ask if the doctor might be willing to accept patients. Sometimes it pays to be the friend of a friend.