President’s Message on target

Dr Christie Newton’s President’s Message in the February 2023 issue of Canadian Family Physician¹ was right on target. Team-based care, as described in the Patient’s Medical Home vision, is precisely what the College should be promoting, and it should be providing the resources and help that will be needed to bring groups of family physicians serving a community together. Clearly large cities and rural communities will need special strategies to achieve this team-based model of care. And governments will need to provide considerable money. But, if it can be achieved, and it will take time, I agree strongly with Dr Newton that it will solve the problems now confronting primary health care in Canada.

Family physicians working in groups alongside nurse practitioners, counsellors, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, and other health care professionals as required can provide more and better care to a much larger population than these practitioners could in total working individually. It sure would help if health care in Canada were national instead of provincial, but I guess that is me really dreaming!

Anyway, what Dr Newton wrote in the February issue was bang on, and I hope that the College makes it a high priority and gets it started. I am now in my 93rd year, but I hope to be around long enough to at least see the process under way. All the best!

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