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Ontario’s NDP wants the time a doctor devotes to paperwork reduced.
According to the Ontario Medical Association, doctors are spending 19 hours a week buried in paperwork.
NDP leader Marit Stiles says investing in more administrative support staff and integrated health teams would free up the equivalent of two thousand family doctors.
“When you speak with family physicians in this province, the number one issue that comes up every time, in my experience, is workload,” says Stiles.
“But specifically, it’s the administrative workload. It’s the paperwork that they have to do. So that piece could be addressed right now, and it could free up physicians to be providing 40% more of their time to treating patients.”
Stiles puts no price tag on her proposal but says not doing it will cost the healthcare system much more.
“We see the waiting hours and the waiting room hours that people are spending in emergency rooms, people getting treated in hallways, people being admitted with much more acute, complex needs. Our healthcare system is bleeding workers right now. That’s costing the system more because we’re having to divert funds to pay for private agency nurses, for example.”
A motion in the legislature was defeated, with Progressive Conservative MPPs voting down the idea.
