durhamregion.com | This Week | Thursday, December 22, 2022 | | 18 There are no easy or quick fixes for the family doctor shortage, an issue plaguing the health-care system. It's estimated that 1.8 million people in Ontario don't have a family doctor and 1.7 million people have a family doctor over the age of 65. In March, the Ministry of Health announced the creation of 295 new medical residency positions in Ontario over the next five years. The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO), the Ontario Medical Association (OMA) and the Ontario Office of the Fairness Commissioner have all argued that internationally educated physicians (IEPs) should be granted access to those new medical residency positions, with a goal of increasing the number of family doctors practising in Ontario. Dr. Rose Zacharias, president of the OMA, which represents 43,000 physicians in Ontario, said one of the OMA's top three issues is to definitely increase the number of family doctors working in Ontario. "We need to act around the doctor shortage, to license more physicians who have trained internationally, who are here in Canada and are not yet licensed. We are working with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario, our regulator, around what a practice-ready assessment would look like so that those physicians could enter the health care system on par with those physicians who are licensed to work here in Ontario," said Zacharias in a recent news conference. That move would help to fill some of the gaps Ontarians are feeling right now. For its part, Lakeridge Health is working closely with Queen's University's medical school to boost the number of family doctors practising in the Durham catchment area. Dr. Tony Stone, former chief of staff at Lakeridge Health and a family doctor himself, said recently that "we train and graduate out of a program with Queen's University Medical School-Lakeridge Durham 16 new family docs a year. Roughly half of them stay in Durham. "We're adding a new program with Queen's that will add another 20 family docs a year. We intend to be part of the solution. But the problem is big, the problem isn't little." That new program Stone referenced is starting in September 2023 and will incentivize family doctors to work in underserved communities like Durham Region. "The goal is to train folks to be able to become part of communities that are underserviced. The traditional medical training model is people do four years of medical school and then they do two years of family medicine residence and then they can go on and do another year of other different training," he said. "In this program, what's going to happen is applicants are going to be applying for a six-year program, where it's a combined medical school and residency," said Stone. Dr. Natalie Leahy has been a family doctor in Oshawa for 15 years and is not currently taking patients, like many other family doctors. "It's (the family doctor shortage) definitely unfortunate. I do work at an urgent care clinic at the Oshawa Clinic and at least 50 per cent of the people you see nowadays don't have a family doctor. I'm constantly getting asked if I'm taking new patients. The only patients I'm taking are those born into my practice," said Leahy. She said that unfortunately, "there really isn't a good mechanism in place to acquire a new family doctor." Leahy points to Health Care Connect, the Ministry of Ontario website that attempts to locate a family doctor for those who don't currently have one. However, she said, "from my experience, people have to keep calling around or they have to have a connection." As a preceptor who has provided supervision during clinical practice for medical students for the last seven or eight years at Queen's University School of Medicine, Leahy said she's concerned not enough students are taking up family practice. "It's definitely a trend I'm seeing in the residents I'm mentoring over the last five to six years. The majority of them are not choosing to enter into family practice right after residency," she said. Leahy said many residents explore options in terms of locuming (replacing a regular family doctor) or are choosing "to specialize, do an extra year or two of training and do something like palliative care, emergency medicine, obstetrics, sports medicine; there's a lot of options for family medicine residents. Very few of them are choosing family medicine." She said there are a number of reasons she feels medical students aren't taking up family medicine: "The administrative burdens keep piling on. I spend a lot of time making referrals to specialists. Each specialist may have their own form, their own system or I send it to one specialist and it's rejected, I send it to another specialist, it's rejected, maybe on the third or fourth try it's accepted or someone is taking patients. If there was some kind of centralized registry for that, it would help. "There is an extreme amount of paperwork involved, especially compared to when I started 15 years ago. And it's definitely contributing to the reason why interns don't want to enter family practice and family doctors are burning out, for sure." She also thinks "post-pandemic burnout is contributing at the moment. Family doctors are very integral in helping the COVID effort. I worked at the COVID assessment centre for 18 months; I did COVID vaccine clinics for eight months on top of my other duties as a family physician and urgent care physician and work at Ontario Shores. A lot of us stepped up and did that kind of work and now we're kind of tired," she said. STORY BEHIND THE STORY: The lack of family doctors in Ontario and Durham Region has led to serious issues for the health-care system and a need to try to encourage more medical students to take up family medicine. We looked for possible solutions. NO QUICK FIX FOR DURHAM'S FAMILY DOCTOR SHORTAGE TIM KELLY tkelly@durhamregion.com NEWS EXPERTS SAY MORE INTERNATIONALLY TRAINED PHYSICIANS SHOULD BE LICENSED Leslie Shepherd/OMA Media photo Dr. Rose Zacharias (left), president of the Ontario Medical Association, said more internationally trained physicians should be licensed to help with the current family doctor shortage. Dr. Tony Stone (top), former chief of staff at Lakeridge Health, said an innovative programs between Lakeridge and Queen's University will increase the number of family physicians practising locally. It begins in September 2023. Dr. Natalie Leahy (above) is a family doctor who practices medicine out of the Oshawa Clinic. Lakeridge Health photo Trinity Design Photograhy/Kriste photo