Dear editor,

I wanted to talk about the shortage of doctors in our area. There are different parts of this problem. There is a shortage at national level and provincial level as well.

Looks like our offers to doctors from around the world are not lucrative enough. Doctors, like all of us, look for best package in terms of money and other benefits like accommodation and vacations, etcetera.

Some countries are doing better in those areas and even providing international doctors paid vacation and travelling paid with return ticket. And same time, we can’t use those doctors too often and cause an excess workload. Again, this can only happen when we have enough doctors.

It’s a very unfortunate situation for any management to be in. Somehow, when we get doctors, they come here and find other places that are better, and then they leave. So getting doctors and keeping them by providing a comfortable lifestyle is equally important. Make sure they have decent work load so they can give time to their family and not be stressed out, because we cannot ignore that part, as we all understand that.

Now another issue; about emergency use, I can say from my personal experience that I have never used emergency just for the fun of it, nor has anybody else in their right mind. People are going to go in emergency because they can not see the doctors in their regular hours without sitting for three to four hours in clinics, and wasting their day of work, so they wait till their condition becomes miserable and they can not bear the pain or impact of the problem, and then they end up in emergency.

Even for referrals, they have to see doctors; that’s the way it is.

Estevan is growing with more and more people, because there are more jobs in this town and the surrounding area. Government is making a good amount of dollars in taxes. This is the duty of all responsible authorities to make sure that people are healthy and comfortable; they will be able to go to work every day and pay the taxes rather than getting sicker without medical facilities, because region will loose its work force slowly. And lastly, it is the responsibility of all of us to push our politicians, cities and towns to keep Estevan and other areas healthy and content by providing the basic need of life, by bringing more doctors and medical facilities to this part of Canada.

Eldrin Dass,
Estevan