Northern communities compete to recruit temporary doctors

Rural and northern Ontario hospitals are competing to recruit locums -- doctors who fill roles on a temporary basis to address staffing shortages and to prevent emergency department closures. (File)

Rural and northern Ontario hospitals are competing to recruit locums -- doctors who fill roles on a temporary basis to address staffing shortages and to prevent emergency department closures.

In many cases, hefty financial incentives are involved and that has triggered concerns about equitable access to health care.

Some doctors and experts say it leaves smaller communities and hospitals vulnerable because they may not have the financial resources needed to entice physicians.

Health-care crisis

Dannica Switzer, a locum in northern Ontario, says that as a travelling doctor, she is acutely aware of the health-care crisis in underserved communities.

She says demand for locum work is high, but the problem is that most doctors cannot help because they are already booked elsewhere.

Experts say generous pay, flexible scheduling and less administrative work that comes with being a locum may impede some hospitals’ recruitment and retention of full-time doctors.

But Ontario Medical Association president Zainab Abdurrahman disagrees, saying the doctor shortage is so acute that locums have become an essential part of the system.

The Health Ministry says its Rural Emergency Medicine Coverage Investment Fund, which replaced the Temporary Locum Program in April, is helping hospitals improve access to emergency care throughout the year.

The ministry also points to the province’s investments aimed at connecting every Ontarian with a primary care provider by 2029, and efforts to add hundreds of seats in medical schools.