Access to several medical services remains a problem for some Canadians, results from the CMA‚s 2000 Physician Resource Questionnaire (PRQ) show. Although 59% of physicians rated access to family physicians in their communities as good, very good or excellent, 35% deemed it fair to poor; 36% also reported that access to specialists is only fair to poor. The PRQ did not ask physicians to rate access to specific specialties, but accompanying comments made by respondents suggest that access to some — such as ophthalmology, orthopedic surgery and psychiatry — is particularly poor.
Physicians seem comfortable with the level of access to routine diagnostic services such as laboratory tests and x-rays, with 79% ranking it as good to excellent and only 14% describing it as fair to poor. However, few physicians think their patients have adequate access to advanced diagnostic tools such as MRIs; only 20% of respondents indicated that availability of these services is good to excellent where they practise. Regional variations were apparent: 69% of physicians in Central Canada consider access fair to poor, compared with 75% in Atlantic Canada and 80% in Western Canada.
The survey also points to problems with the availability of long-term institutional care. Only 24% of respondents consider it good to excellent, with 64% deeming it fair to poor. One respondent pointed out that a lack of long-term-care beds can have a domino effect: ”Long-term-care patients are blocking acute-care beds: dangerous!”
Physicians also appear concerned about psychosocial support services: only 39% indicated that access in their community is good to excellent, and 52% described it as fair to poor.
The 2000 PRQ was mailed to a random sample of 8000 Canadian physicians; 36.3% responded. Results are considered accurate to within ±1.9%, 19 times out of 20. Tables showing the 2000 PRQ results are available online at www.cma.ca/cmaj/vol-163/issue-5/prq. —
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Shelley Martin
martis@cma.ca
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