U of T rejects 2400+ people every year...

[schmitty]

Hmm... I still feel that these doctors in Toronto who accept new patients are nevertheless quite busy and don't often run out of work!

 

I disagree for FM doctors anyway. The three that I am talking about near me all run walk-in clinics everyday (they even take appointments from people who are not their official patients) because they don't have enough work from their own patient load. I can go in right now (one is even in my building) and be seen in about an an hour, despite them being an established family practice for many years.

[10wattbulb]

To be more objective, let's look at some stats:

 

From the World Bank:

 

Physicians per 1000 people - Canada = 2.1 (2010);

 

Andorra (2010) had 3.9; Argentina (2010) had 3.2; Armenia (2011) had 2.8; Australia (2010) had 3.9; Austria (2010) had 4.9; Azerbaijan (2011) had 3.2; The Bahamas (2008) had 2.8; Belarus (2011) had 3.8; Belgium (2010) had 3.8; Bulgaria (2010) had 3.8.

 

Those are only the countries in the A's and B's that fared better than Canada! Note that many of the countries listed above are supposedly not as 'rich' as Canada.

 

CMA estimate of number of physicians per 1000 people in Canada in 2012: There are 2.03 physicians per 1000 population, or 1 physician for every 492 people. (i.e., the situation is not improving too quickly!)

 

*40% (28,782) are aged 55 or older.

 

*75% graduated from a Canadian medical school; 24% graduated from a foreign medical school.

 

Also read this from the CMA (2012): "Canada's MD/patient ratio improves but low international ranking continues." A new human resources fact sheet produced by the CMA shows that Canada had more active physicians than ever before as this year began, but its physician/population ratio remained near the bottom among the 34 nations belonging to the OECD.

 

Interesting facts from a 2007 CTV News article:

 

According to the college's annual report, entitled "Small Triumphs, Big Challenges," 42 per cent of certificates of registration went to international graduates and 37 per cent went to Ontario graduates.

 

This is the third year in a row where licences for international graduates have exceeded those given to Ontario graduates.

 

College president Dr. Jeff Turnbull says many important policy initiatives by the college, government, and other stakeholders have been undertaken in order to address doctor shortages.

 

The report also showed that just 9.6 per cent of doctors in Ontario were accepting new patients in 2006. This is a strong decline from 1999 where 39 per cent of family doctors were taking new patients.

 

This is hard data, not anecdotal evidence, and it seems to support my argument.

[aaronjw]

And what are these physicians paid relative to Canada?

 

 

 

 

To be more objective, let's look at some stats:

 

From the World Bank:

 

Physicians per 1000 people - Canada = 2.1 (2010);

 

Andorra (2010) had 3.9; Argentina (2010) had 3.2; Armenia (2011) had 2.8; Australia (2010) had 3.9; Austria (2010) had 4.9; Azerbaijan (2011) had 3.2; The Bahamas (2008) had 2.8; Belarus (2011) had 3.8; Belgium (2010) had 3.8; Bulgaria (2010) had 3.8.

 

Those are only the countries in the A's and B's that fared better than Canada! Note that many of the countries listed above are supposedly not as 'rich' as Canada.

 

CMA estimate of number of physicians per 1000 people in Canada in 2012: There are 2.03 physicians per 1000 population, or 1 physician for every 492 people. (i.e., the situation is not improving too quickly!)

 

*40% (28,782) are aged 55 or older.

 

*75% graduated from a Canadian medical school; 24% graduated from a foreign medical school.

 

Also read this from the CMA (2012): "Canada's MD/patient ratio improves but low international ranking continues." A new human resources fact sheet produced by the CMA shows that Canada had more active physicians than ever before as this year began, but its physician/population ratio remained near the bottom among the 34 nations belonging to the OECD.

 

Interesting facts from a 2007 CTV News article:

 

According to the college's annual report, entitled "Small Triumphs, Big Challenges," 42 per cent of certificates of registration went to international graduates and 37 per cent went to Ontario graduates.

 

This is the third year in a row where licences for international graduates have exceeded those given to Ontario graduates.

 

College president Dr. Jeff Turnbull says many important policy initiatives by the college, government, and other stakeholders have been undertaken in order to address doctor shortages.

 

The report also showed that just 9.6 per cent of doctors in Ontario were accepting new patients in 2006. This is a strong decline from 1999 where 39 per cent of family doctors were taking new patients.

 

This is hard data, not anecdotal evidence, and it seems to support my argument.

[10wattbulb]

And what are these physicians paid relative to Canada?

 

Aha! So you're concerned about the $$$. Fair enough. The lower the physician/population ratio, the higher the salaries paid, so here in Ont/Canada, doctors are privileged to make big salaries (given we're in the OECD but our doctor/pop ratio is very low).

 

But do NOT tell me that we have a surplus of doctors in Ont/Canada anymore because I checked the stats, and they're not going your way!

[schmitty]

Aha! So you're concerned about the $$$. Fair enough. The lower the physician/population ratio, the higher the salaries paid, so here in Ont/Canada, doctors are privileged to make big salaries (given we're in the OECD but our doctor/pop ratio is very low).

 

But do NOT tell me that we have a surplus of doctors in Ont/Canada anymore because I checked the stats, and they're not going your way!

 

I don't think anybody said surplus.

[10wattbulb]

There needs to be a reduction. We are already training too many doctors. Cut these diploma mills. We don't have the resources, the population, or the positions to support so many doctors.

 

As for UofT, as someone said, not everyone who gets rejected is a med school reject. My alma mater, Northwestern, when I applied way back when, rejected 10,000 applicants (numbers have changed since then). We accepted something like 175 for a class of 160, for an acceptance rate of 1.75%, yet about 30% of all US MD applicants get in.

 

Yeah half the people I hear from go on about a "Doctor shortage" in Canada, and the other half talk about how there's too many and there's no jobs.

 

I could be wrong but I believe the biggest hindrance to addressing physician glut comes from the CMA. It's not in their best interest to have less physicians. As less physicians = less fees so of course they don't want that and it's not *their* problem if physicians have troubles finding work after graduation and residency.

 

5 mins of research to locate physician per capita stats will show we have we gave more physicians than any point in the past 30 years.

 

schmitty, I do think some people said/hinted at "surplus" or heard "surplus" rumours. (see above)

 

Edit: My 'official' position --> Not only is there a net shortage of doctors in Ont & Canada (see stats in my previous post), but there is also a distribution problem that's making things even worst.

[rmorelan]

schmitty, I do think some people said/hinted at "surplus" or heard "surplus" rumours. (see above)

 

Edit: My 'official' position --> Not only is there a net shortage of doctors in Ont & Canada (see stats in my previous post), but there is also a distribution problem that's making things even worst.

 

I have been told most Ontario Deans have been told (ha - definitely on the end of this communication chain) that the enrolment levels will be held steady for a bit.

 

The problem is potentially a doctor shortage (although to be honest I disagree with that point based on the Ontario Needs Based report for Ontario specifically), we definitely have a distribution issues (one of the hardest problems for us to solve - not surprisingly doctors prefer urban areas overall for a variety of reasons) but we also have a specialist distribution problem - we train the wrong types of specialists.

 

The Ontario government wants 50% of all med school grads to go into family medicine - we are not there yet. We are flooding other specialists though - fields that really cannot absorb much surplus - and the situation is getting messy in many fields. Unemployed doctors are not a good thing for anyone

[futureGP]

The Ontario government wants 50% of all med school grads to go into family medicine - we are not there yet. We are flooding other specialists though - fields that really cannot absorb much surplus - and the situation is getting messy in many fields. Unemployed doctors are not a good thing for anyone

 

if the ontario government really wanted 50% of all med school grads to go into family medicine, they just have to cut funding to specialty programs.

 

we already have a lot of family medicine spots going unfilled. if we cut the number of specialty spots, naturally people will get matched to family med.

 

 

so idk what they're really doing by continuing to fund specialty spots if they REALLY wanted family physicians

 

that said, i have little idea on how the distribution of funding occurs for residency spots

[every1knewherasnancy]

so idk what they're really doing by continuing to fund specialty spots if they REALLY wanted family physicians

 

that said, i have little idea on how the distribution of funding occurs for residency spots

 

One reason is that hospitals literally run on residents. If you cut the number of specialist residents, then who will do the work that the residents and fellows do? Do you think the staff physicians will want to come in during the night when they're on call? And where would the extra funding come from to pay staff physicians to do the scut work that residents do for 1/10th the price?

[10wattbulb]

Sounds like the province is going broke little by little....