August 14, 2018 - Tyler Kula, The Sarnia ObserverWhen it comes to residency opportunities for family medicine graduates, Sarnia isn�t on the list.Changing that could help entice more primary care physicians to the area, say a pair of doctors investing $3.5-million in an expansion and renovations at the London Road Diagnostic Clinic and Medical Centre.�Sarnia needs that in order to retain physicians here,� said Dr. John O�Mahony.For comparison, Windsor has 10 residency spots and Petrolia has two, he said, noting Petrolia is the only location with family medicine residencies in Lambton County.O�Mahony and Dr. Sean Peterson recently opened an 8,500-square-foot addition at the 481 London Rd., hospital-adjacent clinic in Sarnia.They moved into the new space about a week ago and renovations are underway to the rest of the building to make it more open, O�Mahony said, noting the work is expected to wrap up in December.The changes, including moving to electronic medical records, and hiring on more nurse practitioners and support staff � first steps towards the clinic�s current 15 doctors working in a team environment � have already reduced wait times, the doctors said.�Involving our nurse practitioners and doing team-based care I think is the way forward because there�s just not going to be enough doctors to care for the aging population,� Peterson said, calling the Sarnia model �a little bit ahead of the curve.�It also features lab and x-ray access, and a pharmacy.The missing piece is creating a learning environment for new doctors completing their residencies so they can get exposure to the Sarnia area and hopefully take root when they open their own practices, O�Mahony said.�Unless they�re from Sarnia, or there�s another compelling reason to come here, this has been a hard place to recruit for,� said the doc who recently joined the board with the Sarnia-Lambton Physician Recruitment Task Force.The doctor recruitment agency has warned in recent years many local physicians with thousands of patients are on the brink of retirement.O�Mahony and Peterson said they�ve both taken on extra patients in the wake of two doctors retiring in July.�There�s a lot of competition with other cities, with other incentive programs,� O�Mahony said. �The future of family medicine I think has � to have a residency program as part of that.�Getting there means working with Bluewater Health and the task force, as well as provincial funding for residency spots, he saidFamily medicine residents also complete a third-year fellowship specializing in something like emergency medicine, obstetrics or palliative care, Peterson said.Bluewater Health is planning to start offering those opportunities at some point in the future, he said.�The vision down the road is we�ll have residents in a two-year program with us and rolling into a third year with the hospital, so it�ll be one nice seamless process,� he said. �And of course the whole goal from a community perspective is to retain them (as family physicians).A Bluewater Health spokesperson said the organization has nothing to announce at this time, but would share information when there�s something to share.Hopes are residency spots in other communities where the need isn�t as urgent can be moved to Sarnia, O�Mahony said.The provincial government doesn�t currently fund enough residency spots for the number of family medicine graduates in Ontario, Peterson said, resulting in many going out of province.�We need to convince the current government that maintaining residency spots in Ontario is important,� he said.tkula@postmedia.com
