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GP shortage a ‘tragic state of affairs’: retiring Saanich doctor

A Saanich doctor’s letter informing patients of his retirement next month spells out the grim reality of the doctors’ shortage in B.C. and what happens to your files when a family physician closes up shop. Dr. Brian S.
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Nearly 300 doctors graduate in B.C. each year, but few choose family practice, according to Doctors of B.C.

A Saanich doctor’s letter informing patients of his retirement next month spells out the grim reality of the doctors’ shortage in B.C. and what happens to your files when a family physician closes up shop.

Dr. Brian S. Pound, 77, is retiring on June 12 after nearly five decades as a family doctor in Greater Victoria. His colleague Dr. Brad Hunter, 66, is also closing up shop.

The pair tried to sell the McKenzie Avenue practice, advertising in medical journals. They had one serious inquiry, but no deal was reached.

Under federal law, retiring family doctors who don’t find someone to take over their practices are required to maintain patients’ records for 16 years.

So with the building’s five-year, $4,200-a-month lease set to expire in July, the pair moved to sign over patient medical records to DOCUdavit Solutions Inc., a document storage company based in Ontario. The files can be transferred to patients’ new doctors — assuming they can find one — or to patients themselves for a fee.

Patients are visiting to say their goodbyes. “This is my family, as it were, and we’re having a lot of tears,” Pound said.

There are also some irate patients, concerned they can’t find a new family doctor and that their files are in the hands of a storage company.

Pound, who said he is not legally permitted to hand patients their original records, is sympathetic.

“I am all too aware of the drastic shortage of GPs opening offices and taking new patients, and strongly believe that there must be a remedy to this tragic state of affairs before general practice becomes extinct in Victoria,” he wrote in a letter to his about 1,000 patients.

“Unfortunately, you are left with the task of searching for a GP who will continue your care.”

B.C. Health Minister Terry Lake revealed this month that the provincial government is unlikely to deliver on a pledge made five years ago to provide every British Columbian access to a family doctor by 2015, although he said “great progress” has been made.

The province’s health recruitment service currently lists postings for 317 permanent family doctor positions, including 16 in Victoria.

While almost 300 doctors graduate in B.C. each year, few choose family practice, said Bill Cavers, president of the Doctors of B.C.

NDP health critic Judy Darcy said the bulge of retirements over the next five years is only going to make the problem worse.

“It’s a crisis of major proportion,” Darcy said. “We have a lot of physicians retiring and I’m not sure what the plan is.”

Sid Soil, a partner in DOCUdavit, said that 20 years ago there would be no need for his business: A retiring doctor would sell or hand over a practice and simply transfer the patient records.

“Our biggest competition is a doctor’s basement, and in that case, how do patients ever get their record?” Soil said, adding that the basement option is neither secure nor easily accessible.

DOCUdavit’s unmarked facility in Ontario, where the Victoria files will be stored, is highly secure, and the records remain the property of the doctor, Soil said.

To access their records online, Pound’s patients will pay DOCUdavit a maximum fee of $89.60. Records on paper or CD cost up to $107.60. The maximum charge for a family of four is $197.20; for an additional family member, the maximum is $56. The company promises that requested documents will be shipped through a courier within four weeks.

Canadians unaccustomed to paying for health-care expenses may be surprised by the record fees, Soil said, but they are not covered by provincial insurance. (Most doctors offices will also charge for copying a file. According to Doctors of B.C. guidelines, the recommended fee for a simple transfer of medical records is $33.85, plus any photocopying or courier fees.)

Patients who can’t pay, will have the fee waived, Soil said.

“Anyone who can’t afford it, they simply contact us and we always make sure they get a copy of their record. It’s never a question,” Soil said. “We have never not provided a patient a copy of their record. We can’t — it’s not even a matter of choice. We have to provide a patient with their record once they request it from us.”

Darcy said a number of constituents have brought fees charged by document storage companies to her attention and no one has mentioned that the fee could be waived.

“Everyone who has broached it with me has told me it’s a fee they have to pay,” she said.

“I’m mindful that there are families for whom $180 is a big burden and patients for whom a four-to-six-week delay can be critical, so I think there is a bigger policy issue at stake here.”

ceharnett@timescolonist.com