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New CMA President: A view shaped by best and worst of care
Sunday, August 26th, 2012
15 August 2012
Dr. Reid said that the health-care system has become so big and complex that “we sometimes stray from what it is to be a healer”… the patient voice and the patient experience and the patient perspective has been so far from people’s minds for such a long time that it will take time for things to change… physicians face big challenges, including crushing workloads, scarce resources and loss of autonomy, but they cannot allow themselves to lose their identity as physicians and their primordial duty to patients. “Patient-centred culture does not cost a penny more”
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
‘Real inequalities’ a threat to Medicare’s mission, incoming CMA chief says
Saturday, August 25th, 2012
12 August 2012
“We need equitable distribution of health care resources and services so that… everyone has equal access to important health-care services,” Dr. Reid said. Beyond pushing for universal access to essential medical care, she said she will use the CMA presidency to raise awareness about the role of the socio-economic determinants of health, and the need to focus on marginalized groups like aboriginal people, those with mental illness and the isolated elderly.
Tags: economy, featured, Health, ideology, Indigenous, mental Health, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »
India is showing Canada the way with action on health care
Tuesday, July 10th, 2012
Jul. 09 2012
Canada has been talking about national pharmacare for decades. There has been little action and an endless litany of excuses, foremost that the constitutional division of powers is an impediment. It’s hard to imagine that our constitutional quirks are harder to overcome than the complex regional, religious and political divisions in India. Yet India is forging ahead with fundamental health reform to ensure a healthy population and a healthier economy, while Canada continues to futz around.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
The importance of picking a vocabulary for dying
Tuesday, June 19th, 2012
Jun. 19 2012
Gloria Taylor, who suffers from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, won the right to end her life at the time of her choosing… What do you call the right she won? Physician-assisted suicide? … there are many more variations, each loaded with legal and moral baggage… The language we choose tends to reflect where we stand on the underlying question of whether grievously and irremediably ill people should have the right to choose to end their lives rather than let an illness take its course. Ultimately, the fundamental legal issue is choice…
Tags: Health, ideology, pharmaceutical, rights, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Dragging medicare into the 21st century
Sunday, May 27th, 2012
May. 24, 2012
Regardless of political allegiance, there is near unanimity that a universal health system is a good thing – for reasons of economics and social justice. That’s why every Western country save one has a universal system. When it comes to health care, only the United States is morally bankrupt and economically inept… The reality is that every other developed country has universal health care that is better, fairer and cheaper than ours. We are big on grand pronouncements such as, “Medicare is what defines us as Canadians.” But we are laggards on the practical side.
Tags: budget, featured, Health, ideology, rights, standard of living
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
Harper’s disregard for aboriginal health
Saturday, April 14th, 2012
Apr. 09, 2012
The abysmal health status of First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples is Canada’s greatest shame… There’s a disturbing pattern here. The government has also cut funding to the Aboriginal Healing Foundation. And the First Nations and Inuit Health branch at Health Canada oversees what is without question the worst health system in Canada, making every effort to slough the responsibility off onto the provinces and territories… “The Conservatives want out of the aboriginal business.”
Tags: budget, Health, Indigenous, rights, standard of living
Posted in Equality Delivery System | 1 Comment »
How do we control physician costs?
Sunday, April 1st, 2012
Mar. 20, 2012
In its last deal, the OMA did well, squeezing 12.5 per cent in pay increases out of the government over four years – 3, 2, 2 and 4.5 per cent annually from 2008 to 2012… Very few doctors get a set salary that can be frozen… About 70 per cent of Ontario doctors now receive some level of alternative funding but, over all, 70 per cent of their earnings come from fee-for-service billings. In the recent report of the Commission on the Reform of Ontario’s Public Services, Don Drummond said this equation should be flipped so that doctors receive 30 per cent of their pay via fee-for-service. Otherwise, it’s virtually impossible to control costs.
Tags: budget, Health
Posted in Health Delivery System | 1 Comment »
Don’t shut disabled kids out of society
Sunday, February 5th, 2012
Jan. 31, 2012
Dr. Snowdon makes three main recommendations: * Create a single online reference tool that lists all community programs, services and professional care available to people with disabilities. * Invest in programs where disabled kids are integrated, not segregated, so they can feel part of their community. * Find ways to expand the social networks of children and teenagers to break the isolation… being a “virtual” citizen is only a baby step in the right direction, it’s not enough… isolation was far more painful to live with than physical or development disabilities themselves.
Tags: disabilities, participation, rights, standard of living, youth
Posted in Inclusion Debates | No Comments »
The premiers want more health-care study? Seriously?
Tuesday, January 24th, 2012
Jan. 24, 2012
We don’t need more studies or committees. Every royal commission, provincial inquiry, independent analysis for the past five decades has come to the same basic conclusions about what we need to do reform medicare: * Control spending by limiting medicare coverage to essential treatments that work; * Modernize primary care by moving away from solo physician practices to interdisciplinary teams; * Create some kind of universal prescription drug plan; * Shift money from institutional care to home care … [and] … invest it in palliative care.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »
Shrewd tactics not the same as good health policy
Tuesday, December 20th, 2011
Dec. 20, 2011
… the deal offered by Mr. Harper’s government is reasonable. It is fiscally responsible, tying spending increases to inflation… [but] federal funds be used to exercise leadership and foster innovation (or to “buy change”… there are areas, such as catastrophic drug coverage and homecare, where there are gross regional disparities… Federal dollars should be used to level the playing field, to ensure there is a semblance of a national medicare program. That should be a goal even for a government that, philosophically, believes in decentralization, as the current one does.
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »
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