Health Archives — Lindsay Advocate

Free memberships for hospital available, complete with voting rights

Published on June 14, 2019 in Health by Joli Scheidler-Benns

Free memberships to Ross Memorial Hospital are now available again for a very short time. Since inception, RMH had public memberships where for a low annual or lifetime cost, people could have a vote on issues related to hospital decisions.

These public memberships were revoked at an AGM meeting on June 21, 2012. At that time, the board and 42 members of the community voted to end this option. Currently voting for issues related to hospital changes are now restricted to the hospital’s board of directors.

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New organization, HERS, ‘Helping End Rural Silence’ on rural, domestic violence

Published on June 4, 2019 in Community/Health by Roderick Benns

HERS: Helping End Rural Silence is a new volunteer outreach group that hopes to raise awareness and start conversations about domestic violence in rural settings.

“While we care about all victims of domestic violence, women in rural areas such as small towns and on farms face specific challenges,” says Paola di Paolo, HERS organizer.

“Domestic violence is not an easy topic to discuss; people who are victims rely on us to talk about it.”

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Advocates for health care anxious about timing of Ross Memorial’s ‘special legislation’

Published on May 24, 2019 in Community/Health/Provincial by Joli Scheidler-Benns

With recent ‘merger memories’ still top of mind, Kawartha Lakes Health Coalition (KLHC) members are alarmed over the future of Ross Memorial Hospital after reading the public notice about new special legislation initiated by Ross near the same time as the passing of the PC’s omnibus Bill 74.

KLHC formed soon after the Lindsay Advocate released a feature analysis last year that showed mergers rarely work out well for the smaller hospital, usually leading to less services offered, and nor do they work well as a cost-saving exercise. A huge community outcry followed and KLHC and its supporters were able to blunt the momentum toward any merger.

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Blame Wynne for some of the doctor shortages Kawartha Lakes is facing

Published on May 12, 2019 in Community/Health by Geoff Coleman

Blame Wynne for some of the doctor shortages that Kawartha Lakes facing

The family doctor shortage in Kawartha Lakes, and the rest of the country, might not be so bad today if the previous provincial Liberal government had done things differently in 2015.

In Ontario, after a medical student graduates, they don’t immediately start a practice. First, they must complete a residency where they train with established physicians for at least two years and up to four years depending on the discipline.

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Kawartha Lakes Health Coalition wonders why Ross making key structural changes

Published on May 10, 2019 in Health by Lindsay Advocate

From the Kawartha Lakes Health Coalition

On April 18 this year The Ross Memorial Hospital (RMH) posted a notice in the legal section of the weekly Metroland corporate newspaper. The notice stated that the hospital will apply to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario to enact special legislation to change its name to “Ross Memorial Hospital” (dropping “the”), as well as “change its objects, its powers, the composition of its board and membership, and to repeal certain existing Acts.”

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Game on! Wards Lawyers Kids’ Road Hockey Tournament might be Canada’s biggest

Published on May 10, 2019 in Community/Health by Jamie Morris

What could be more Canadian than a road hockey game? Well, how about a tournament with no fewer than 12 road hockey rinks and games running all day?

The Wards Lawyers Kids’ Road Hockey Tournament in support of youth mental health is set for Sunday, May 26. According to lawyer and organizer Jason Ward it will probably be the nation’s largest kids’ road hockey tournament.

All that will be missing when it gets underway at 8 am will be game-pausing cries of “Car!” (Kent Street, from Cambridge to York, will be closed to traffic for the event.)

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Bobcaygeon doctor strikes with other community members against PC cuts

Published on May 9, 2019 in Health/Poverty Reduction by Asa Coleman

When Ontarians from all walks of life took part in a ‘general strike’ to oppose cuts made by the PC government under Premier Doug Ford recently, Dr. Steve Oldridge of the Bobcaygeon Medical Centre was among them.

The physician is a champion for rural health care and the Ontario Basic Income Pilot program quashed by Ford’s government.

“With the rising gap between minimum wage and the living wage, you have a situation where people can’t afford to eat,” Oldridge says. “Poverty is the greatest determinant of health.”

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New doctor at Omemee Medical Centre; chose CKL after training here

Published on May 7, 2019 in Community/Health by Lindsay Advocate

The Kawartha Lakes Health Care Initiative (KLHCI) and Omemee Medical Centre are pleased to announce a new doctor for City of Kawartha Lakes. Dr. Satvir Sahans will be joining the Omemee clinic, as of August 1.

Sahans attended Simon Fraser University in British Columbia for his Bachelor of Science Degree. He completed his Medical Degree at the University of Queensland in 2015 and Family Medicine Residency at the University of Toronto in 2018. Sahans will be accepting new patients through Health Care Connect. If you are not currently registered with Health Care Connect please contact them directly at 1-800-445-1822 or www.ontario.ca/healthcareconnect.

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Child and youth mental health issues impact entire family

Published on May 1, 2019 in Health by Teresa Rye

The mental health of a young person is equally important as their physical health. This reality can be lost in a world of competing demands on our health care system. The statistics suggest that one in five children and youth in Ontario will experience an issue related to their mental health and that five out of six (almost 85 per cent) will not receive the treatment they need for various reasons.

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Unfinished business: Time for a national Pharmacare system

Published on April 29, 2019 in Health/Poverty Reduction by Trevor Hutchinson

More than 15,000 people in Kawartha Lakes do not have adequate prescription drug coverage. Far too many of our fellow citizens with a needed prescription can’t afford to get the medicine, or they ration the prescription in ill-advised ways. Not filling a prescription (or rationing incorrectly) due to the price of medications is something experts call “cost-related non-adherence (CRNA).” That’s a fancy way of describing people who can’t afford to take their drugs properly, if it at all. And the number of people who are forced to do this is staggering, because of the lack of a national Pharmacare system.

A 2015 survey found that “24 per cent of Ontarians reported that they or a member of their household did not take their medications as prescribed, or missed medications, due to cost.” Given that, according to the CMAJO, “drugs for mental health conditions were the most commonly reported drug class for cost-related non-adherence.” It’s clear that prescription drug cost is a major problem, not just nationally, but locally.

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