Minister releases Nova Scotia's doctor recruitment numbers: they're up slightly

Nova Scotia Health Minister Michelle Thompson fields a question in Halifax on Wednesday, Sept. 29, 2021. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan)

HALIFAX -

Nova Scotia's premier on Thursday touted his government's success in recruiting doctors to the province and ensured that he had a multi-pronged approach to improving health-care access for residents.

Houston made the comments after his government released statistics showing that between April 1, 2022, and March 31, 2023, 168 new doctors started practising in Nova Scotia -- although the net gain was only 86 physicians because 82 doctors left the network over the same period.

The premier said the province is gradually "moving the needle," but he conceded that the number of new doctors practising in Nova Scotia needed to be higher.

"Our efforts of the last 18 months are showing tangible results," Houston told reporters. "We'll need more (doctors) but my commitment to Nova Scotians is that they will have access to care they need when they need it, and I think we are seeing that through a number of access points."

Other than recruiting more doctors, the government, Houston said, has been working to increase access to primary care through mobile clinics, virtual care, urgent treatment centres and pharmacy clinics.

"Our focus is on access," he said. "Physicians provide access, but there are other channels."

As an example, the premier said that a pilot project involving 12 pharmacy clinics dealt with more than 4,000 strep tests between Feb. 1 and the end of April.

"We know where those tests (patients) would have went -- they would have gone to the emergency departments," Houston said, suggesting that the pilot reduced pressure on hospitals.

The statistics show that Nova Scotia's health authority hired 155 doctors, while IWK Health hired 13. Of the doctors who were recruited last year, 78 are family doctors and 90 work in other specialties. Nova Scotia is still missing 73 specialists and 96 family doctors, the province says.

Meanwhile, between June 1, 2022, and May 1, 2023, the number of Nova Scotians who registered to find a doctor rose from 94,855 to 145,003 -- an increase of 52 per cent on a trend line that has consistently pointed upward.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 18, 2023

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