HALIFAX - Cumberland North MLA Elizabeth Smith-McCrossin is calling on the province to put a higher priority on hiring physicians in Pugwash and the surrounding area to alleviate local emergency room closures.
Smith-McCrossin tabled a petition in the legislature on Tuesday with 44 signatures and gave 31 letters to the Health and Wellness Minister Randy Delorey on behalf of local residents.
“The North Cumberland Memorial Emergency Care Centre has been closed too often,” Smith-McCrossin said in a news release. “This has created unsafe medical situations in our community and we would like to put a stop to these closures.”
Smith-McCrossin said the government must do more for rural healthcare and smaller emergency rooms.
“The minister of health must work with his department and the health authority to hire physicians to provide medical coverage in the emergency department and primary health care in the community,” Smith-McCrossin said. “People in rural areas are suffering because of lack of access to adequate healthcare services.”
Closures are frequent at the Pugwash hospital as well as at the Springhill and Parrsboro collaborative emergency centres.
These closures are impacting the county’s largest hospital, the Cumberland Regional Health Care Centre near Amherst.
Recently, Smith-McCrossin called on the province to add enough funding to put another doctor at the regional hospital – even if for just four to six hours a day when it’s busy.
On Tuesday, the province announced it’s changing the physician incentive program to add more flexibility and choice.
Geographic restrictions for the Tuition Relief Program, the Family Medicine Bursary and the Debt Assistance Plan have been removed to support the recruitment of family doctors to urban areas. Previously, the programs were only available to doctors in rural areas.
The minister said the changes were made because doctors and medical residents asked for more flexibility. Delorey said doctors are needed in rural and urban communities.
He hopes this will be an added incentive to doctors considering practising in Nova Scotia.
