OLDS — Currently, the provincial government doesn’t tell doctors where to have their practice, but maybe that’s an idea worth discussing, says Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills MLA Nathan Cooper.
Cooper made that comment during a Feb. 10 appearance before Town of Olds council, adding however that he personally is more in favour of incentivizing doctors in other ways to practice in rural areas.
He was responding to a question by Coun. Wanda Blatz, who said she’d like to see more doctors and nurses practising in rural Alberta “because it seems to be rural Alberta that's missing a lot of our physicians and our nurses.”
Cooper said, “The provincial government does a number of things to incentivize doctors working in rural Alberta.
“At present, the provincial government doesn't tell doctors where to practice and perhaps that's conversation that needs to take place in the future.
“You know, I think that I'm inclined to try to incentivize doctors to make decisions that make the most sense to work in rural Alberta.
“Forcing people to work in one area of the province or another rarely sets both that individual and the community up for success."
Cooper noted that several communities in his constituency are working hard to recruit and retain doctors and other health care professionals.
He said the further away communities are from the Highway 2 corridor, the harder it is for those communities to lure doctors and nurses.
“(You) get west or east of Highway 21, on the other side of the constituency and into that Drumheller/Stettler special area side of the province, it becomes very difficult to recruit doctors,” he said.
Cooper said policies that encourage new medical graduates to practise in rural Alberta for a certain amount of time “can be helpful.”
“When doctors get established in rural Alberta, they often stay in rural Alberta, but it's getting them out there that sometimes is a challenging part,” he said.
