We registered her in the access window for a GP and during my pregnancy I checked with my GP […] but they are all overwhelmed, says Ms. Babin.
The $245 paid for each visit gives the couple peace of mind. Health is priceless, her spouse adds.
Similar story south of Montreal, in Montérégie.
During our visit to the practice clinic in La Prairie, a senior didn’t hesitate to quickly book an appointment with a specialist nurse practitioner (SNP) for a urinary tract infection.
We’re not bringing that with us [l’argent] “Au paradis!” Louisette Parent replied.
Louisette Parent, a practice customer
Photo: Radio Canada
No family medicine group (GMF) doctor was available, and neither she nor her accompanying daughter wanted to wait five to six hours in a hospital emergency room.
645,000 patients are waiting
It has to be said that many families still do not have access to a general practitioner or health professional in an FMG.
There are 645,000 of these patients across Quebec, including nearly 250,000 in Montérégie, Lanaudière and the Laurentians.
According to the Department of Health, 87 to 90% of the Montreal Crown population has access to front-line service, including Front-Line Access Window (GAP).
There are a growing number of private clinics run by specialized nurses in the greater Montreal area. The practice chain, for example, has opened five clinics in the last six years. They come to fill a lack of services that the public sector does not provide on demand. Reporting by Davide Gentile.
A growing market
As Praxis executive director Geneviève Dubé explains, it is certain that in Montreal’s northern and southern crowns, access to healthcare is even more complicated.
Practice manager Geneviève Dubé
Photo: Radio Canada / Ivanoh Demers
Over the years she has observed the evolution of the clientele.
People who are employed, retired people, people with better means, some who have less means and save come to us because they don’t have access to the public system of health services, explains Ms. Dubé.
Since 2016, the company has taken the opportunity to gradually open five private family health clinics around Montreal.
We have also bet on expanding the scope of the NPs to offer an alternative solution to the 377 FMGs in Quebec that use the health insurance card.
Since 2021, SNPs have been able to diagnose diseases, prescribe tests and medications, schedule medical treatments, and conduct antenatal check-ups, among other things, without medical supervision.
38 IPS at practice
Frontline IPS, Estelle Fournier, made the decision in 2020 to leave the public network and move to the private sector.
I was frustrated with the working conditions and often got the public impression that I was there for the benefit of the doctors, she says.
Estelle Fournier, one of the 38 IPS at Praxis
Photo: Ivanoh Demers
Ms Fournier is not the only one who made this decision. Practice now employs around 100 people, including 38 IPS and 7 doctors.
The company is part of the Sedna Health Group. Owned by European interests, Groupe Santé Sedna presents itself in Quebec as the government’s leading partner in the management and delivery of health care and services.
The group employs more than 4,000 people working in long-term care, home living, rehabilitation and family health clinics. It is run by a former CEO of a healthcare facility and counts among its administrators former Minister Michel Clair.
Other private clinics offer IPS services at appointment locations.
In the meantime, the public network is still looking for IPS staff at any of the four clinics that have opened in the Montreal area in recent months.
Radio-Canada recently announced that these clinics are accepting a third of the planned 650 patients per week.