Doctors Manitoba

In today’s message you will find:

It’s Manitoba’s turn to elect the next President-Elect for the Canadian Medical Association, and this week the CMA released the names of the five candidates who are running! The President-Elect is elected by CMA members in a rotating province or territory every year. The President is the primary national spokesperson for the CMA’s work and advocacy on behalf of the medical profession, as well as CMA representative with provincial and territorial medical associations, government and other stakeholder organizations.

The candidates include, in alphabetical order:

Doctors Manitoba and the CMA will be sharing more information about the candidates in the weeks ahead, with a meet-the-candidates webinar planned for February.

The election period runs from February 22 to March 8, 2023. To vote, you must be a member of the CMA by February 16, 2023. If you are unsure if your membership is current, you can contact CMA member services at memberservicecentre@​cma.​ca or by calling 1−888−855−2555. You can join or renew your membership online.

For more information on the selection of the CMA President-Elect, click here.

Earlier this week, our President Dr. Candace Bradshaw sent an update about our advocacy and negotiations with government for physicians, following a meeting she had with Premier Heather Stefanson and Health Minister Audrey Gordon. She outlined the two lanes we are pressing for more funding and support for physicians, with the traditional Master Agreement negotiations route for longer-term issues like remuneration increases and more complex changes to remuneration models, and a ​“fast track” path for more urgent issues. We encourage you to read her update here.

The fast-track path will leverage the government’s $200 million Health Human Resource Action Plan announcement last month to implement one-time or short-term improvements to recruit and retain more physicians in Manitoba. Based on your feedback, we have identified several priorities for government, and one month later we can report they have already acted in three specific areas.

First, the government reversed a directive that restricted physicians working in Access Centres and Community Health Clinics from billing for work completed after hours. The impact of this directive could have resulted in 66,000 fewer patient visits per year, and led to physician retention and recruitment issues. Luckily, the government reversed the Manitoba Health decision.

Second, the government announced this week it will be acting on our recommendation to create a centralized service for physicians to obtain specialist advice and consultation and arrange urgent patient transfers. Called VECTRS (Virtual Emergency Care and Transfer Resource Service), the project will initially focus on emergency medicine specialist consultation and urgent transport, with a goal to launch by May. The current uncoordinated approach can be frustrating and distressing for busy physicians, and fixing it was a key recommendation coming out of our Rural Health Summit earlier this fall.

Dr. Candace Bradshaw explained that ​“this new service will make it easier for doctors to consult emergency medicine specialists and arrange urgent patient transfers between hospitals, and we hope to see it expand in short order to include other specialists too. Doctors are wasting time on inefficient administrative tasks, but changes like this will help to give us more time to do what we love, and that’s providing medical care to Manitobans.”

You can watch this 2‑minute CBC story about VECTRS, or learn more about the announcement in this government news release. We will be meeting with health system leaders in the weeks ahead to provide physician feedback on how this service should develop, and we invite your feedback on this. You can contact us at practiceadvice@​doctorsmanitoba.​ca.

Third, the government has finally approved our request for an expansion of virtual visits to include group psychotherapy, something psychiatrists have requested for a long time. A separate notice has been sent to psychiatrists with further information about this change.

While these actions are quite specific in their focus, we believe there is a broader shift — government is listening to our advice on behalf of physicians and is now starting to take action. We are pursuing additional recommendations with government on a number of other more immediate issues focused on physician recruitment and retention and supporting physician health. We will continue to provide updates as progress is made.

Advocacy Continues on Other Issues

Our advocacy continues in a number of other areas. Our negotiations have begun for the next Master Agreement, to replace the existing agreement that expires in March 2023. You can read more about it in this update from Dr. Bradshaw earlier this week. We recognize there is a large accumulation of issues raised through specialty bloc working groups, and these are firmly on our radar. In family medicine, we are raising how we can improve existing remuneration models, while also pressing for the additional option of a blended model similar to what was recently announced in BC (see this update sent yesterday to family physicians on this matter).

We are also continuing our work to address some immediate crises in health care right now. This includes:

This is not an exhaustive list. You can always check in on concerns you think Doctors Manitoba might be able to help with by emailing us at practiceadvice@​doctorsmanitoba.​ca.

Respiratory Virus Update

Manitoba Public Health has shifted from a Thursday COVID report to a Friday weekly report on respiratory viruses, given the triple virus threat in the province right now. Below are highlights from this week’s report.

COVID Surveillance

This week’s report covers the week ending December 10 and again shows decreased activity for COVID compared to recent weeks. Highlights include:

Influenza & RSV

Influenza activity continues to be high, similar to last week. Case counts are lower than expected because of delays in documentation of lab results in PHIMS.

Earlier this week, we heard about continued pressure at Children’s Hospital (see Shared Health update here). Children’s elective surgeries that are not time-sensitive are being postponed to free up surgical and recovery nurses to help out in critical care units. 

Meanwhile, the University of Manitoba is extending its mask mandate for the winter term.

Bivalent Booster for Children 5 – 11

Manitoba Health advises that a bivalent booster vaccine has been approved and recommended for children aged five to 11. Children in this age group have previously been eligible for a booster dose with the monovalent (original) Pfizer pediatric vaccine. This is the first bivalent booster vaccine available for this age group. This vaccine is being delivered to Manitoba this week and will then be shipped to vaccine sites across the province. The vaccines are expected to become available at sites the week of Dec. 19. However, to ensure children can receive a bivalent booster dose, book the appointment for Dec. 23 or later or check with the provider to confirm availability.

eChart Update

We understand that Shared Health Digital Health is migrating to eChart 2022, to work better with modern web browsers, offer customizable user preferences and flexible screen sizing. See this update for further details. We have received some concerns from physicians with respect to the usere interface and difficulty locating certain information. A training video is available as a first line of support. Digital Health has asked us to collate your concerns to share with them as part of their improvement work. Please send your eChart feedback to practiceadvice@​doctorsmanitoba.​ca.

Smoking Cessation Program Expanded

The Tobacco Quit Card and Counselling Program launched on Nov. 28. This program provides counselling and up to $300 in nicotine patches and aids for low-income patients of participating clinics across Manitoba.

Eligible Manitobans will receive: 

Who can participate?

For more information, visit www​.shared​healthmb​.ca/TQCC.

Please note that the Doctors Manitoba offices will be closed from December 23 to December 27 and from December 30 to January 2. Between Christmas and New Years, some staff are taking vacation. Please continue to contact us at general@​doctorsmanitoba.​ca.

It’s been another busy week of health care news! See below for stories we’ve curated for you, including Doctors Manitoba commenting on rural ER closures and the new VECTRS service. 

DRMB in the News

Other Health Care News

Here are some important and top-read recent updates, in case you missed them:

Upcoming events are always listed on our events calendar.

Feature Event: Quit multiplying by zero: leveraging LEADS to enhance physician wellbeing — Online Workshop — Thursday, January 26 4 – 8pm

This workshop will help you extrapolate LEADS into action to address this critical issue of physician wellbeing. We will define and normalize these concerns, understand stress and how to recognize when it turns into distress. Health will be defined as a shared responsibility between the individual, the culture of medicine and the healthcare system in which we work. We will address how physician leaders can best support their teams at this time. The 5Cs framework for resilience will be defined, and practical strategies to help colleagues to implement this and manage their stress effectively, both in their professional and personal lives. At the end of this workshop, you will be able to identify at least three leadership actions you can take to bring LEADS to life in the service of creating a healthy work environment. Learn more here.