These two very important concepts do not fit well together, here in this province, where thousands of  Canadian citizens, tax payers and residents do not have the luxury of actually having a family doctor. The latest system – since this year – requires patients to call into one call centre, one phone line, early in the morning. From there you may request a secondary centre. To be put on a phone wait list (I was told that 2000 call in daily),  to somehow get a doctor appointment for the same day. Strangest thing is, that when I call at exactly the time those phone lines open, I may be already #50 in line. Thanks a million. To expect to see a doctor that day when there are only a few working.

Family doctors are needed for all and anything, like requisitions for tests, prescriptions for medications, referrals to specialists and treatments.

Should you ever be so lucky to see a specialist (let’s say for a long-standing serious heart condition), you can be assured that wait times are up to 3 years. 

Of course you’re dead by then. Probably the intention of this system.

As far as FAMILY DOCTORS go:

I have had a regular family doctor all my life, since I was born. During World War 2, when our entire country was destroyed, then later when working and residing in other European countries, then after leaving Europe in 1974, as a foreign student at a US university, then after coming to Canada, 30 years working in Alberta, until the year 2002.

That’s when I came to live in British Columbia.  This shows clearly that the problem is not the patient, but the Government and their non-functioning system.

Over and above, should one have the rare “privilege ” to have an appointment with a specialist, often the patient without a family doctor is not treated nicely and with respect, but like an outcast.

BTW. Probably it would have been better to keep the old de-centralized system in place, with multiple walkIn clinics in all areas of the capital region, instead of the now not well-functioning centralized one, after closing all WalkIn clinics.

Signed: A hardworking and tax paying Canadian citizen