A Lower Sackville walk-in clinic, where three doctors had worked and saw up to 100 patients a day, is closing.
Patients arriving at the Community Care Walk-in Clinic on Cobequid Drive Saturday discovered a notice on the office door saying the clinic would be closing at the end of the month.
“It is with tremendous sadness and frustration that we have made the decision to close our walk-in clinic,” the notice stated.
“Unfortunately, despite our best efforts to recruit new physicians to work at this clinic, we have been unsuccessful, leaving an untenable work schedule for those of us remaining at the clinic.”
Sackville-Cobequid NDP candidate Lara Fawthrop is calling on Premier Stephen McNeil to intervene and find a solution for the displaced patients.
“Where are these people now supposed to go?” said Fawthrop. “Are they supposed to go to Cobequid Community Health Centre next door? That hospital’s emergency department is already working well beyond capacity.”
She said the Premier needs to acknowledge that there is a critical shortage of family doctors in Nova Scotia and that there’s a health-care crisis in the province. “Then there needs to be a plan to deal with the crisis,” said Fawthrop.
The notice to patients said the clinic would likely reopen in May under new ownership.
Brad Johns, Sackville-Beaver Bank Progressive Conservative MLA, had warned Health Minister Randy Delorey about the situation at the walk-in clinic nearly two months ago during question period at Province House.
During the Feb. 28 exchange, Johns informed Delorey that more than 19,000 people used the Lower Sackville clinic last year and then asked whether Delorey was aware that it had been slated to be closed by the end of April.
Johns asked the minister to assure residents that the clinic would remain open. But he didn’t get the commitment he was looking for. The minister did say that primary care remains a priority for his government, that it continues to invest in collaborative care practices and that 25 new physicians had been recruited to the province through its new immigration stream program. But the minister didn’t answer Johns’ question.
So Johns tried again: “Mr. Speaker, I need the minister to clearly explain to residents of Sackville where they’re supposed to go for non-urgent medical care?”
The minister responded speaking broadly about his department’s recruitment efforts, but he did not answer the question.
The McNeil government has faced intense public scrutiny over the doctor shortage situation in recent days after a Facebook video emerged of an emotional 33-year-old mother with cancer challenging the premier to acknowledge that there’s a health-care crisis in the province.
Inez Rudderham was diagnosed with Stage 3 anal cancer after going two years without a family physician and repeated ER visits failed to pick up her disease. In January, she was put on a waiting list for counselling with Mental Health Services and found out this month that she’d have to wait until July to get it. She dared the premier to have a face-to-face meeting in the video, which has since gone viral and has been viewed well over 2 million times.
