Group seeks virtual care options post-pandemic
Since March 2020, there have been more than 3.1 million virtual visits with physicians in Manitoba, according to a release from Doctors Manitoba.
The organization represents more than 4,000 physicians and medical learners across the province.
They’re calling on the province to extend virtual care past the pandemic, based on the success of what is currently in place.
I have mixed feelings about this one. Living out in the sticks it would be very handy to do some of this stuff with a phone call. On the other hand more serious things need an actual visit and I can see doctors sluffing a number of these off because they’re just not in the mood. Thoughts?
I have really been grateful for online calls. Even in a major urban area, it saves lots of transit time and for most things it has been very convenient for essentially routine things (e.g. antibiotics for UTI, follow-up call to explain things about slightly unusual blood tests). In one case, I was uncertain about whether or not something on my skin was ‘normal’ and an in-person appointment was easily arranged. I’m in favour.
I have too. Going into the office is a big PITA, UNLESS you should. My dr. knows me fairly well, so over-the-phone diagnosis/prescription for stuff I have had before is awesome. I love it and so does my doctor. I agree that this system could eventually be abused though.
A few months ago, I had a video session with a medical specialist. The clinic set up a link and we chatted at the appointed time. We took care of business just as easily that way as we would have had we met in person.
At least I didn’t have to sit in the waiting room, nor did I have to deal with snarky support staff.
One thing I really don’t miss is arriving at the designated location, be given instructions on everything I am and am not allowed to do. My wife comes in with me at my insistence (being an old fart I pretend to be befuddled so they let her stay as my “caregiver”) and she can’t even sit next to me in the waiting room because of these idiotic rules. We have to mask. We are surrounded by continuous reminders that Canada is no longer a free country. I have to beg special permission to use the bathroom because of COVID cleaning rules. My blood pressure is quite literally about 20 points higher on office visits. I have literally been yelled at for not observing the whole six foot thing. We get spritzed with disinfectant, shuffled about, and some staff are nice but a lot of them act like you are a nuisance they need to be protecting the poor doctor from. Compare that to being in the comfort of my own home doing stuff or peeing whenever I need to until I answer the telephone.
And I forgot the indignity of COVID screening. Right in front of everyone else in the room … “Have your bowel been normal for the last 48 hours, Justin?”
“I prefer to be addressed as Dr. Burch please,” you immature little condescending twerp, I think.
“Of course Justin, err Dr. Burch.” giggle giggle “Have your bowel movements been normal for the last 48 hours?”
“Why do you need to ask me that?” I reply.
“Oh it’s routine,” giggle giggle. “Abnormal bowel movements can be a sign of COVID. We have to ask everyone.”
“Are you a doctor?”
“Oh no. This is just screening.”
“I will discuss my bowel movements with my doctor not you.”
“Well it’s the rules. We have to ask everyone these questions. Have your bowel movements been normal for the last 48 hours?”
“Have yours?” I reply.
“That’s not relevant Justin, I mean Dr. Burch.”
“Look Missy, whatever your name is, I know the symptoms of COVID. I assure you I have none. Beyond that I not answering any of your questions because it’s none of your damn business.”
At this point the twerps give up and look at my wife in despair and she smiles in sympathy and they leave me alone.
+++++ 🙂
At least you get them to address you as “Doctor”. I get dirty looks from the support staff when I try that with them. They seem to think that “Doctor” is a protected title, reserved only for physicians and dentists (uh, no). On top of that, they think they’re smarter than me (“I work with physicians. Physicians are smart, therefore, I am smart.” Yeah, right.)
Then there are the “zero tolerance” policies. In other words, the staff is allowed to mess up or be rude to you and not be held accountable for it. Any reaction on your part that’s short of sunshine and rainbows or absolute and unquestioning compliance could result in being booted out for good.
Whatever happened to “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen”?
“…nor did I have to deal with snarky support staff.”
The best reason ever for not visiting the doctors office. Beyond the snark, just what do these people do?
Not a whole lot. See my comments @7:18 PM.
Walk-in clinics are the worst.
Many doctors are now nothing more than glorified government workers. In the US they are cogs in the Obama-care/Insurance Industry complex.
It would be useful to see some real innovations in AI and diagnostic technologies.
I support the human element in doctor/patient interactions, but doctors get much of their humanity crushed out of them in med school, the “self-regulating” professional authorities, and the government health bureaucracy.
Anti-biotics and trauma medicine are lifesavers, but with all our ingenuity and technical advancements can’t a Free Market free us from the toxic Big Pharma cartel and Rockefeller medicine?
Living far from the city I absolutely love the long distance aspect of this. Instead of a three hour drive into Winnipeg, trying to find parking, navigating my way around the hospital and finally ending up in some waiting room, while doing all the COVID procedures, I can drive 30 minutes and talk to a specialist via video link at the local personal care home. The other nice thing about this my risk for being exposed to COVID at a small local clinic is far less that it would be in Winnipeg. One doorway into the telemedicine centre. And as a bonus I have found doctors tend to be very conscientious about timing for these teleconferences. I have never had a specialist be late for one whereas when you drive into the city they just don’t seem to care how late they are or when they get to you. So it’s a really great thing for consulting with a specialist.
Now for the family doctor it is also really great. My family doctor’s office is 110km from my home. For most things I don’t need to be sitting in his office. This includes things like getting a prescription renewed. He likes me monitor my blood pressure. I take it at home, send him the results once a month. He calls and we have a chat. It’s a lot easier on me and a lot easier on him. No long drive, no sitting in a packed office. (I can’t tell you the number of time I have developed a cold or flu after sitting in a doctors office, never mind COVID.) I can be at home doing stuff while waiting for the telephone call. When I have an actual issue that needs me to see him in person, like when I injured my leg, I call in and make an appointment. Because in the past doctors did not get paid unless they actual saw you in the office, all of us wasted a lot of time and energy on office visits.
This program is a sensible, appropriate and I think money saving way to manage the low population density of rural Manitoba.
Total horseshit. My doc (Onterrible) has been doing this for quite some time now. She won’t even see a patient without doing a phone call first. Phone calls are by appointment only and there’s usually no appointments…so one has to beat the rush at 8am in the morning to just maybe get a chance at getting a same day call. Most of my family are like “eff it…may as well go to a walk in clinic or emerge.”
That doctor is double billing. Time to find a new doctor though that can be very difficult. Also be sure to complain to her about how hard it was to get that appointment. Many doctors have no idea what their unsupporting staff are doing to protect them from their patients.
I agree completely
And Clinics aren’t better -give symptoms to a check-in clerk from 6′ away in a waiting room then told to go wait in your car in the parking lot for the doctor to phone you.
Anything that allows one to escape domestic medical constraints is helpful. The ability to utilize foreign doctors for example. In Canada, if you want timely service and you’re queued up you can wait or leave the country. Anything that helps the later is an improvement. Just think about the opportunity to get an Indian Doctor to give you a prescription for Ivermectin or failing that, sending it in the mail directly to you.
I prefer doing things over phone, video, or Net. Saves me time, money, and aggravation. I like that I can send pacemaker telemetry in remotely in five minutes instead of having to take at least half a day off of work to travel to a different town.
More of this, please.
I prefer it – way more efficient, just did a physical in May (in person o/c), wasn’t bullied about the vax as I don’t want it, follow up call six weeks later about a new med I need and follow up blood work. She, a NP, did check to make sure I was taking Vit D which I am, plus I garden and go outdoors in the sun.
My HB on the other hand has a new male physician and he was just in to see him over an RX this past week. Doc was all in his face calling him selfish for not getting vaxed. HB says, I’ve done my research – Doc says; they, those internet doctors – it’s just their opinion!! My HB just let him go on and oe but never backing down, by politely refusing to get a schedule for the start of these. HB asked if he could get a test to see if he’s had covid and Doc made it very clear it was going to cost him and a rigmarole to get it done. Unless his work is forced to force him to – we will prefer our natural immunities over the jab of whatever that which’s brew they’ve got going on.
I can’t stand my family doctor. She is absolutely useless. On the odd time where I have needed a doctor I went to a walk in clinic. Luckily I’m healthy and as far as I know I don’t need one. Last time I saw a doctor was because I was 50, and hadn’t had a check up in a decade. I booked a physical, the doctor had the nurse weigh and measure me, the doctor listened to my heart for 5 seconds then sent me to the lab to have blood tests done that no one ever bothered to tell me the results of. It was a total waste of time effort and money, and unless I’m hit by a truck and end up in a hospital against my will, I’m not seeing a doctor again. Pointless waste of time. If there is something wrong with me that needs treatment they’ll just put you on a waiting list until you die anyway.
Look after your health on your own, the medical system is useless.
50 is just a baby. Sorry to hear you wasted precious hours of your youth by going to see the white-robed voodoo priests.
I like your attitude. Back in the day when Canadians were REAL, my grandfather died of an apoplectic fit. So says his obituary notice from the local newspaper, which for some reason is online. He was in the 99th year of his age, and he dropped dead in his son’s house, where he was living at the time. Probably never saw a doctor in his life. He was an independent, land-owning farmer. He probably kicked the bucket reading a newspaper article about something that idiot Laurier had been up to.
Look after your health on your own, the medical system is useless.
Yup.
Many years ago, I was made aware that there might have a certain medical problem. Whenever I asked my physician at the time about it, I got nothing but bafflegab and BS.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t the only one. I approached several of his fellow practitioners and most of them were simply using my condition as an excuse for pumping the system for $$$.
I eventually did a bit of research on the Internet about my situation and learned at least enough to be able to ask an informed question.
Eventually, the problem became quite severe and I checked into an emergency ward. It took a few days before I got a specialist who not only seemed to know what he was doing but gave me a straight answer.
“post-pandemic”?
If you need to see a good Canadian doctor fast….move to Florida. They are all there and thriving in their private practices.
I came down with shingles a few weeks ago. I took a picture of it I emailed it to my doctor and phoned him. He said Yep you got shingles. Here’s a prescription take it to the drugstore. Shingles are gone.
You are fortunate. Have a friend who developed a nasty skin condition and was told to send a photo to her family doctor. Dr totally misdiagnosed it. Fortunately, said friend knew a somewhat retired dermatologist and – in desperation – asked him for advice. Turned out the family doctor had seriously misdiagnosed the condition.
Do not currently have a family doctor. The one I have had for many years just disappeared at the beginning of Covid. Know that because youngest offspring seriously needed to see her and was told “not available”. Fortunately, a nearby clinic was advertising that had a new family doctor accepting patients so offspring is going there and seems to be getting competent treatment.
Moi, I’m still somewhat under the old clinic, partly because that’s where spouse goes and it can be seriously advantageous to have both partners treated by the same medical team. However, if can’t get proper care there, will go elsewhere.
Virtual doctor visits suck big time.
When you see a doctor in person, most of the time they just guess without diagnosis.
It’s even worse when they can’t see you, the guessing is way farther off the mark.
To them everything is just an allergy or heartburn.
No thought to refer you to a specialist when the problem is way above their training level.
“I never took virology when I went to medical school.”
I would welcome having e-consultations all the time. At least I wouldn’t feel like my time was being wasted waiting around. More than once, when I needed to see my GP, I made the earliest appointment I could get, usually 9:15 a.m. I made sure to be on time, but the doctor was nowhere to be seen, and didn’t even show up at the office until after 9:30. Then I got to wait another half hour or so while she got herself organized, and then finally, I got a whole THREE MINUTES of her time, which she spent typing something onto the computer before ordering a bunch of blood work. Every. Single. Time. I’ve given up ever getting something that resembles health care from her. I go to the walk-in clinic. It pisses her off because they charge her for my visit, but I don’t care. My time is valuable too.
Most things you need to -talk- to a doctor about, you can handle it in a video or phone call. That’s just how it is. If the doctor can jettison that amazingly expensive office and those super-duper expensive and yet oh-so-bitchy ancillary staff, they will not be under the gun of having to chug-a-lug 120 patients a day through their facility trying to crack that huge overhead nut every month. They can cut it down to maybe 40 or 50 patients, and have a solid 5 minutes to think about your issue.
Also, if your doctor doesn’t have to commute to that expensive office every day, they’ll be a lot more likely to see some extra patients when they would have otherwise been wasting their time sitting in traffic.
Most people LOVE the phone and video meetings. Most people HATE schlepping their sick, sorry @$$ to the doctors office to sit there and catch Flu-O’-The-Week in the waiting room. 99% of the time the visit involves nothing that couldn’t have been done on the phone. The other 1% of the time they need to see a specialist anyway.
Final thing to consider: doctors in Canada have not had a raise in 10-15 years depending on the specialty. Nobody -has- to be a doctor. The people who become physicians are the top 10% of humanity if you’re measuring by ability. Pretty sure they can find something else to do that earns more money and has a lot less stress.
All those doctors have tasted the sweet life of cutting loose the office, knocking down that obscene overhead and working from home for a year and a half now. You think they’ll go back? Really?
Distant competence far exceeds the value of local mediocrity; but places a reasonable burden of honesty on the patient.
Very useful for pre-operative screening. Many patients coming for surgery do not need an in-person pre anesthetic evaluation. Telephone or tele-conference is quite sufficient. And for patients in rural areas, it saves them a ton of time, hassle and gas not having to make an extra trip into the city. Some patients do need to be seen in person but the remote screening minimizes that number. It’s the modern age, the technology is here; let’s use it.
Let’s make our socialist Healthcare virtual. We keep our tax dollars and send them virtual money instead. I’ll use my real money to pay a good actual doctor for treatment as i require.
Using video consultations is common in remote areas such as western Alaska. There aren’t many people there and they’re often in small isolated communities. Going to, say, a dentist involves a major trip to a larger centre, such as Bethel, and can take several days.
What’s often done is that those villages send one of their own to school for training. In dentistry, they become dental therapists and are qualified to perform minor procedures such as tooth extractions after returning and setting up a practice. That saves a lot of time and money. Consultation via satellite is available, as there is next to no cellphone service in that region, and only major cases are sent out of town.
In Alberta, HSAA accuses the on-line consultation “an attack on public healthcare.” Or, in English, taking away union turf. Just read the reviews of the Telus app and you can tell who actually has it and who are just lazy public union bastards.
Here in Ft St John it’s almost impossible to see or even get a phone appointment with a doctor. When I call to make an appointment I’m informed that there’s nothing available until next month but they can’t book that far ahead until they get the schedule from the hospital. Can I please phone back in a week or two as soon as the clinic opens. When that day arrives they’ve told every caller for the past 3 weeks the same story, and they’re all calling at the same time. It’s like waiting by the pool at Bethedsa Gate, waiting for an angel to stir the waters. If I’m finally able to get through I’m told that I’m too late, they’re booked up for the next month too but if i call back on the 1st Monday of the new month, right at 9 am, they’ll be happy to book me an appointment. Much better to take care of yourself and avoid the clinic as much as possible.
I live in an urban area in the States where I have access to multiple urgent care facilities and walk-in clinics within a 10 minute drive. If I need to see someone in a hurry I will use telemedicine when I absolutely know what the problem is instead of spending hours of time at the urgent care place or a walk-in clinic for them to tell me the obvious, and in the case of the urgent care place after doing all they can to run up the bill.
Sure is a good thing they didn’t diagnose my wife’s cancer over the phone. I swear this covid crap has lowered the IQ of most people by about 20%.
I like the idea but used telemedicine for a month in December, made no progress with my malady. Finally felt so bad in January I said the hell with it and went to urgent care. Who transferred me to the ER, who put me in the hospital. For a week. Supposed to have surgery to repair my heart valve soon. The telemedicine guys did not have a clue.
My doctor’s practice has an app now where if it’s not super time sensitive I can correspond with my doc. I LOVE it. For annual exams and such I go through the COVID indignity of an in-person visit but otherwise I can ask a few questions or ask for tests and he gets back to me in a day or two.
Also I now get an uploaded copy of my actual test results rather along with his interpretation which is excellent.
My husband has just had a medical issue over the summer and we’ve been treating it closer to home at the rural hospital nearby, but our doc had been monitoring from his office.
Much much appreciated avoiding 4 hour round trips. By far the best thing about the pandemic.
Remote care is perfectly fine for results, i.e. blood tests, CT scans etc.
Never for diagnosis.
Yeah, it is great for lots of stuff, especially follow ups, results, etc. If your doctor is so dumb and lazy that they aren’t taking your care seriously and know when they need to see you, then seeing that doctor in person isn’t likely to help much.
My GP just sent out a memo to all patients at the clinic pleading with them to be patient. They are chronically short staffed and trying to make most visits “virtual” is insufficient to offset the added trouble of dealing with Covid protocols and a chronic staff shortage. They are trying to put the best face on the situation, but as socialized medicine continues to implode, this is only going to get worse.
Doctors – many from 3rd world shit holes are establishing virtual practices in which they never actually examine patients – all done on line – they can work from home , order the examinations from medical clinics and invoice the system $300 for a virtual exam that takes 5 minutes.
If you are looking for a prescription renewal, they are fantastic. Otherwise the worst thing, and I mean the worst thing ever to come out of our dysfunctional system. During COVID I was understanding but we don’t even get a video call it’s a disembodied voice over the phone, might as well be the janitor. The one lesson I have gotten from the pandemic is how little Doctors actually know, never let doctors decide public policy, they just aren’t any good at it.