A6 NewsLeader Friday, January 31, 2014
OPINION NEWSLEADER’S VIEW:
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QUESTION OF THE WEEK:
Sizeable ruling A court decision on Monday awarding the B.C. Teachers Federation $2 million in damages, and ordering a return to class size and composition provisions in a teachers’ contract from almost 15 years ago, is almost certain to lead to political strife. Some estimates suggest the cost of the judgment to taxpayers could total $1 billion. If that indeed is the case, the provincial government is almost certain to appeal, as Premier Christy Clark hinted on Tuesday. The ruling by B.C. Supreme Court Justice Susan Griffin speculated (because there is no hard evidence on the record, due to cabinet confidentiality) that the provincial government deliberately stalled on renegotiating the class size and composition provisions with the BCTF in 2011. Griffin was the author of an earlier court ruling calling for new legislation within a year. In her ruling, she stated “(Negotiators’) strategy was to put such pressure on the union that it would provoke a strike by the union. The government representatives thought this would give government the opportunity to gain political support for imposing legislation on the union.” Nothing else in the lengthy ruling, other than a suggestion that cabinet documents back up this assertion, offers any proof. Those cabinet documents have not been released, but were used as evidence in the trial. The class size and composition provisions were inserted in a contract imposed by the former NDP government on school boards. There is no doubt that if classes are too large, it has an impact on how students learn. But hard and fast limits, imposed by a judge, will be costly to taxpayers, and have limited benefit for students. – Langley Times/Black Press
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The family physician dilemma I had a doctor’s appointment earlier this month. Time for my post-40 physical. Even though I had an appointment, I was made to wait a couple hours. As frequently happens—because my doc delivers babies too—she was out bringing new life into the world. Frustrating. Even when she returns she’s rushed, trying to catch up. And I’m lucky. According to A GP for Me, an initiative of the provincial government and the BC Medical Association, approximately 176,000 people in B.C. don’t even have a family doctor. My bet is that number is actually much higher, but regardless, A GP for Me aims to fix that. For now, many people just go to the walk-in clinic and get whomever is on duty. From my experience, the service is curt, and a far cry from what you’d get when you see the same person, year-in, year-out. Dr. Baldev Sanghera, a local family physician, agrees. A family doctor provides continuity and a consistent
Chris Bryan editor@newwestnewsleader.com
connection that helps the patient stay healthy between visits too, says Sanghera, who is the lead doctor in the Burnaby Division of Family Practice, which represents almost all family doctors in Burnaby with the goal to support local doctors to benefit the whole community. The group is also the local lead on A GP for Me, and is in the process of surveying residents and medical professionals to find ways to boost the number of family doctors and the amount of patients served. It’s important, Sanghera says, because people with a family doctor are healthier and put less stress on the medical system. Even if you’re just in the office with a bad cold, he says, it’s a chance to receive coaching on healthy lifestyle, stress reduction and the need for strong relationships. “We know stressful lifestyles
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make people sick,” he says. “We’re coaching as well as treating and diagnosing.” So what has caused the family doctor shortage? Sanghera says women becoming family doctors has led to a “more sensible” idea of full-time work. They’ve pursued a more family friendly 35- to 45-hour work week instead of the 60-70-hour weeks common in the past. A positive development, he says, but it also means less service from the same number of doctors. The health care system shifted too, from a focus on primary care through family physicians to a greater emphasis on specialists and acute care. Med school teachers today are usually specialists, and students tend to gravitate the same way, Sanghera says. And with the costs of training rising, students seek areas with better earning potential (read: specialization) to pay hefty student loans. Though family practice often pays less, the training costs the same. But if the A GP for Me initiative succeeds, everyone
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wins, Sanghera says. “We’re all coming to the same realization that things can’t continue the way they have. The only way to reduce the cost of health care is to keep people healthy—and there’s lots of things we can do to help people achieve that.” Sanghera says they plan to release the full results of their consultations in June. The goal is to recommend workable solutions that provide lasting results. “We want to align all the information we get and come up with a full, comprehensive plan.” Ironically, despite my frustration with long waits at my doctor’s office, Sanghera says she is going above and beyond, adding he stopped delivering babies 10 years ago due to the stress of running his office simultaneously. “She’s one of our heroes—she’s trying to do all she can. The rest of the people can wait, the baby won’t.” And he says the best way to improve my satisfaction is to improve her work life. “The system needs to provide her more support, and more physicians.”
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