NDP pledging team-based health care

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This article was published 09/09/2023 (1118 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Brandon Clinic may become a medical facility that offers more collaborative health care, the leader of Manitoba’s NDP party said during a campaign stop in the Wheat City on Friday.

Wab Kinew announced plans for a clinic that would take a “team-based” approach to primary care.

The clinic would have physicians, nurses, mental health experts, social workers and occupational and physical therapists on staff to offer more services more quickly to those with multifaceted health issues.

“Brandon will have a specific share earmarked from our province-wide initiative, where we are announcing funds to allow existing family doctors and clinics around the province to be able to expand their offer to become that primary care team-based approach that the experts across the country say is the future of primary health care in Canada,” Kinew said.

Brandon was included in funding that was announced by Kinew Friday morning in Winnipeg, with a pledge — if elected, to open a total of five clinics — four in Winnipeg and one in the Wheat City over four years, at a cost of $33 million to cover operating expenses.

While in Brandon Friday afternoon, the NDP leader made his campaign announcement on the lawn of the East End Community Centre under the water tower, which is about five blocks east of the Brandon Clinic.

The Brandon Clinic cancelled walk-in services July 4 because of a severe shortage of family physicians and burnout because of heavy workloads, as the Sun reported on June 24.

Having a medical facility that offers a primary-care team will benefit patients but will also help to recruit and retain doctors in Westman, added Kinew.

“If we put this primary-care, team-based approach here in a community like Brandon, we’re going to be sending a strong signal and incentive to future family doctors, that this sort of practice is going to give them a work-life balance. In short, bringing primary care teams to Brandon is part of a recruitment offer to future family physicians to come here and set up shop.”

In attendance during Kinew’s announcement Friday afternoon was Darcy Bell, the chief executive officer of the Brandon Clinic.

“The collaborative team approach — we support that. We already have health team professionals working in the Brandon Clinic including registered dietitians, community health workers, a community facilitator and clinical pharmacists, so we are supportive of expanding that approach,” Bell said.

While Bell is still concerned about doctor burnout, and the challenge of recruiting new physicians, he said he was encouraged by Kinew’s additional campaign pledge to open 10 new doctor training seats for Westman medical students.

Under the NDP’s plan, $6 million is earmarked to work with the province’s post-secondary institutions and representatives of health-care workers to create the new seats, with the hope that people from Westman will fill them.

Reacting to Kinew’s announcement, Michelle Budiwski, the Manitoba Liberal candidate for Spruce Woods said, while a family care centre with primary care in Brandon is needed, an urgent care centre to relieve immediate ER pressures would be even better.

Budiwski added that the Manitoba Liberal Party has already released its intention for community-based medical training in partnership with a new medical school at Brandon University.

And while 10 new doctors in training would also be welcome, Budiwski said: “It is a drop in the bucket to what we need, especially as Brandon and Neepawa hospitals expand. If the NDP open the new Winnipeg ERs they are also promising, will these 10 doctors remain here in Westman?”

Len Isleifson, the Provincial Conservative candidate in Brandon East, said he is struggling with how Kinew is going to create clinics, open hospitals and emergency rooms when there is a shortage of people.

“When the NDP was in power, they never went through the COVID-19 pandemic,” Isleifson said. “The entire health-care system in North America, and around the world, has taken a devastating hit because of COVID-19, so they didn’t go through that.

“And yet, in 17 years when they were in power, they never, ever put any contingency plans in place for physicians who are retiring down the road. So for lack of planning and preparation, he’s now blaming on a current government for their inability to act.”

The Provincial Conservative candidate for Brandon West, Wayne Balcaen, said while in power the NDP was the founder of “hallway medicine,” and added that his government has a funded plan for hiring more nurses, doctors and health-care workers.

“I’m just thinking of the debt clock that their leader is starting to accumulate,” Balcaen said. “He’s made millions of dollars in promises and said that he won’t raise taxes or that he won’t increase fees. It just logically doesn’t make sense to me of how you can do that with his promises. So again, they’re empty promises.”

The funds announced on Friday are part of the NDP’s previously announced $500-million recruitment strategy to hire 250 health-care providers for medical clinics and doctors’ offices across the province.

» mmcdougall@brandonsun.com

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