The Ontario government has announced that it is moving ahead with the funding of 25 Nurse Practitioner (NP)-led clinics. Three are being set up immediately, and the remainder will move forward in the spring. All will be in operation by 2011-12.
“Nurse practitioners bring unique and valuable skills and expertise to patient care teams across Ontario,” Premier Dalton McGuinty told a news conference last Friday.
However, the Ontario Medical Association remains opposed to the move. It says the government should instead be supporting the creation of an additional 150 Family Health Teams as promised in the election.
“At a time when financial resources are stretched thin and there is a shortage of nurses it would seem more appropriate to open additional collaborative care teams that we know are having a positive impact on patients,” OMA President Dr. Ken Arnold said in a news release.
The OMA maintains that Family Health Teams are more cost-effective since they have higher patient caseloads than NP clinics. Dr. Arnold said the government has the “responsibility to demonstrate to taxpayers that these clinics are delivering on the outcomes that patients expect.” He said the government has not done this.
Not surprisingly, the Nurse Practitioner Association of Ontario holds the opposite view.
“There are tens of thousands of unattached patients in the province who do not have access to a primary health care provider,” NPAO President Tina Hurlock-Chorostecki said in a news release. “Nurse practitioners have demonstrated they provide safe, effective and quality health care to patients of all ages.” HE
