VICTORIA, B.C. – Today, the Minister of Health announced a new payment model to retain and attract family physicians in British Columbia. Sonia Furstenau, Leader of the B.C. Greens and MLA for Cowichan Valley, has issued the following statement:
“It is good to see concrete action that recognizes the challenges family doctors have been facing, and that acknowledges the diverse needs of patients. Amending the current system to compensate doctors who spend more time with their patients is a good step forward.
“This announcement seems to address the major concerns family doctors have around compensation and fairness, and recognizes the growing burden of costs they have while practising under the fee-for-service model.
“What we needed to see with this plan is how government will measure outcomes, and those measures should include the number of British Columbians getting attached to a family doctor, the number of family doctors recruited, and an increase in preventive care.
“We also hope this is a signal from this government that they will move away from Urgent Primary Care Centres, which have been demonstrably ineffective. We remain committed as B.C. Greens to a vision of community health centres in which doctors do not have to operate as businesses, but are supported to create primary care teams that deliver healthcare within a community and patient-oriented system.”
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Media contact
JoJo Beattie
Press Secretary
B.C. Green Caucus
+1 250-882-6187 | [email protected]