A Happy New Year to all of our patients from everyone here at the Phoenix Medical Practice.
We will re-open for the New Year on Wednesday the 5th of January.
January 3, 2011
December 4, 2010
Need for charity sign of unfair society
Christmas Message 2010
Poverty affects us all - lets work to eliminate poverty - 'feel good' giving is a symptom, not a cure.
The need for charity is something that makes me very angry. It reminds me that our society is unjust. The poor continue to be poor, while the rich get richer. Rich people 'feeling good' about giving a few dollars or a few hours of their time to the 'deserving poor' is something I would love to see the end of.
In a fair society, the rich would pay more in tax and that money would go to raising the poor out of poverty.
In their book The Spirit Level, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Picket argue that everyone - rich and poor - is more happy in societies where the gap between rich and poor is less*. Money can't buy you happiness if it makes someone else poorer. We certainly see that every day in our medical practice. Patients who are sick and dying because they can't afford basic medications. They don't need charity, they need free prescriptions funded by taxpayers. Not only will the poor be happier then (they won't die as young), but the rich will be happier too (their tax money won't be wasted on unnecessary hospital admissions). I regularly waste tens of thousands of dollars of tax payers money admitting patients to hospital because they could not afford a $60 prescription. I'm tired of seeing legions of patients who are not poor, but are stressed and miserable because of the fear of losing money and becoming poor. If we had a proper social safety net, that fear would be less and they would be happier.
And don't waste time on the kind of ignorant narcissism displayed by far too many successful people that the poor are poor because of their own choices. We are all the product of our genes and our environment. The rich stack the table against the poor from before conception (leverage) and then add insult to injury by blaming the poor for being poor. 'Feel-good' giving to charity based on that view is like running someone down with your car and then feeling good about yourself because you gave them a band-aid.
A recent report by PEI MLAs recommends that our Social Assistance programs need an overhaul and more money. This, they say, is a matter of social justice not charity.
This Christmas season lets do some real good. Lets express some justified anger. Lets push for a future in which charity 'turkey drives' are just a memory of a dark and unfair past.
Poverty affects us all - lets work to eliminate poverty - 'feel good' giving is a symptom, not a cure.
The need for charity is something that makes me very angry. It reminds me that our society is unjust. The poor continue to be poor, while the rich get richer. Rich people 'feeling good' about giving a few dollars or a few hours of their time to the 'deserving poor' is something I would love to see the end of.
In a fair society, the rich would pay more in tax and that money would go to raising the poor out of poverty.
In their book The Spirit Level, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Picket argue that everyone - rich and poor - is more happy in societies where the gap between rich and poor is less*. Money can't buy you happiness if it makes someone else poorer. We certainly see that every day in our medical practice. Patients who are sick and dying because they can't afford basic medications. They don't need charity, they need free prescriptions funded by taxpayers. Not only will the poor be happier then (they won't die as young), but the rich will be happier too (their tax money won't be wasted on unnecessary hospital admissions). I regularly waste tens of thousands of dollars of tax payers money admitting patients to hospital because they could not afford a $60 prescription. I'm tired of seeing legions of patients who are not poor, but are stressed and miserable because of the fear of losing money and becoming poor. If we had a proper social safety net, that fear would be less and they would be happier.
And don't waste time on the kind of ignorant narcissism displayed by far too many successful people that the poor are poor because of their own choices. We are all the product of our genes and our environment. The rich stack the table against the poor from before conception (leverage) and then add insult to injury by blaming the poor for being poor. 'Feel-good' giving to charity based on that view is like running someone down with your car and then feeling good about yourself because you gave them a band-aid.
A recent report by PEI MLAs recommends that our Social Assistance programs need an overhaul and more money. This, they say, is a matter of social justice not charity.
This Christmas season lets do some real good. Lets express some justified anger. Lets push for a future in which charity 'turkey drives' are just a memory of a dark and unfair past.
November 29, 2010
New Walk In Clinic Thursday mornings 10 to 12
Following on from the success of our Rapid Access Clinics (which have been running weekdays 10am to 11am), we've decided to trial a Walk In Clinic on Thursday mornings. This will replace the Thursday morning Rapid Access Clinic and will run from 10am to 12am.
It will be open to everyone, even if they are not our patient. Patients attending the Sherwood Medical Center walk in clinic on Thursday mornings will be re-directed to our practice upstairs*. There should be space for up to 60 patients each morning, with the doctor being assisted by a Practice Nurse, a Pharmacy Technician, and three Health Care Technicians. We are hoping to keep waiting times short.
If it proves successful, we may add a second Walk In Clinic earlier in the week.
* And on the weeks that we are closed, our patients can attend the Sherwood Medical Practice walk in clinic downstairs instead.
It will be open to everyone, even if they are not our patient. Patients attending the Sherwood Medical Center walk in clinic on Thursday mornings will be re-directed to our practice upstairs*. There should be space for up to 60 patients each morning, with the doctor being assisted by a Practice Nurse, a Pharmacy Technician, and three Health Care Technicians. We are hoping to keep waiting times short.
If it proves successful, we may add a second Walk In Clinic earlier in the week.
* And on the weeks that we are closed, our patients can attend the Sherwood Medical Practice walk in clinic downstairs instead.
November 22, 2010
GPAQ Questionnaire Week
This week is Questionnaire week at the practice. Once a year we distribute questionnaires to patients visiting the practice. We use the answers to help us find ways to provide better care.If you have an appointment at the practice this week, you may be given a questionnaire when you check in. Please read the questionnaire carefully. Don't fill it in until after you have been seen by the doctor or nurse. Once you have filled it in, you can drop it back into reception. If you would prefer, we will give you an envelope so you can take the questionnaire home and mail it back to us later.
The questionnaire we use is the GPAQ questionnaire. It is specially designed by Manchester University in England for family practices. It is used by most NHS family physicians in the UK. We have been running it for several years.
The questionnaire is given to 60 consecutive patients for each doctor and nurse in the practice over the week. It is anonymous. Staff will not know who has filled in each questionnaire.
The questions relate to how easily you can access care at the practice, waiting times, and how helpful you found your visit to the doctor/nurse. We use these answers to look for areas where we can improve what we are doing.
Thank you for helping us to help you.
October 29, 2010
Far too many patients still at risk from influenza - Scottish practice showing us up!
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| Our computer system speeds up the flu clinic and improves safety |
We have a lot of work to do after a disappointing start to our free flu clinics for our at-risk patients . Only
This is shockingly bad. Strachur Medical Practice, our Scottish sister practice is miles better at this with 95% of their Heart Disease, 100% of their Chronic Bronchitis and 100% of their Diabetic patients vaccinated in 2009.
It means that the great majority of our elderly and chronic illness patients are at higher risk of catching influenza and dying this year. This is just not good enough.
We want to vaccinate at least 75% of our at-risk patients. This is based on the World Health Organization recommendations. You can watch how we are doing via this page and the tracker on our home page. They update with live data every 60 seconds.
We're now going to extend our access to free flu shots:
- To avoid confusion, flu shots are now free for all patients.
- We are going to run a drop in flu shot clinic every weekday from 10am to 2pm
- We are going to run an evening flu shot clinic from 2pm-6pm every Thursday.
- Our nursing team are going to be chasing up our at-risk patients.
Our Scottish sister practice is way ahead of us. Come on Canadians! Don't let the Scots show you up. You can do better!
October 10, 2010
New Schedule
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| Our new schedule is now up and running. |
We've moved the appointments around to reduce the waiting times. We've spaced out the medical appointments because they had the longest waits on the day, and we've started our Rapid Access Clinics for people who just need two or three minutes with the doctor. The Rapid Access Clinic runs weekdays from 10am till 11am.
Reduced waiting times
We trialled the new schedule last week, and on Friday (when most of the bumps had been ironed out!) the average waiting time for patients was down to 17 minutes. That's a great improvement from the average of around 1 hour that we had before we moved to the new premises, and the average of 35 minutes that we had with the old schedule. We continue to be able to offer appointments usually within a few days.
Our waiting times (both on the day, and for booking ahead) are displayed on our home page.
New opening hours - evening clinic on Thursdays
A couple of changes to hours as well. This is mainly due to the fact that we have had to postpone having a second doctor. The front desk will be open only from 10am until 2pm daily. We will also only be answering the phones between these hours.
We will now be offering appointments every weekday, but only between 10am and 2pm (except the Treatment Room Nurse who will remain open from 8.20am until 4pm). For patients who find it hard to take time off work, we will be starting an evening clinic running to 6pm on Thursdays from next month.
We're really pleased with this new schedule, and we hope it will make accessing care even easier for our patients.
September 26, 2010
Practice Nurses Tackling Obesity Epidemic
Canada is in the middle of a deadly obesity epidemic.
Which life do you want future generations of Canadians to have?
Obesity is classed as a Body Mass Index (BMI) of over 30. BMI is the ratio of your weight to your height.
The Pheonix Medical Practice computer system contains the height and weight of all of our patients who have been for their initial visit with our clinical team. Each night our computer re-calculates every patient's BMI and works out what percentage of our patients have a BMI over 30.
Today, the computer says 28% of patients at the Phoenix Medical Practice are classed as obese. In 1980 that figure would have been around 10%.
Obesity is a very serious medical condition.
Obesity is a killer. It puts a strain on your heart, lungs, blood vessels, and joints. Your risk of getting diabetes goes up with your weight. The World Health Organisation (WHO) suggests that 58% of diabetes, 21% of heart disease, and up to 42% of certain cancers are caused by higher weight (BMI above 21).
Condemning our children to a life of sickness and early death
Basically, your chances of being sick and dying young go up with your weight. As obesity rates rise, our children face a life of ill health and short lifespan unknown since the rise of modern medicine.
It's a nightmare that is unfolding so slowly that few are noticing it even happening. Combined with the body image problems of a size zero obsessed fashion industry, we have a society that has a terminal weight problem.
What can we do about it?
The solutions are actually quite simple in theory. We build roads that give priority to cyclists and walkers, we force the food industry to reduce hidden sugar and fat, and we tax sugary and fatty foods. Of course, none of these things are going to happen any time soon in a capitalist economic system addicted to unhealthy food and big cars. That's a discussion for you to have with your politicians. Dr Jenni Zelin is hard at work doing a great job pushing for more cycle lanes in PEI
In the mean time, our Practice Nursing Team will be following the WHO advice. The WHO is urging family physician teams to intervene with healthy eating and lifestyle advice. Our team of nurses are already doing that. They have lists of patients who are obese, and they will be working through the list calling them to offer them support and advice. Our Practice Nurses can run a very successful weight management program with these patients.
The WHO wants to see this introduced nationally. It thinks 40,000 Canadians will be saved if it is. We agree. Our team is already hard at work doing this.
 |  |
| Fast food, slow death (North America) | Healthy for life (Denmark) |
Obesity is classed as a Body Mass Index (BMI) of over 30. BMI is the ratio of your weight to your height.
The Pheonix Medical Practice computer system contains the height and weight of all of our patients who have been for their initial visit with our clinical team. Each night our computer re-calculates every patient's BMI and works out what percentage of our patients have a BMI over 30.
Today, the computer says 28% of patients at the Phoenix Medical Practice are classed as obese. In 1980 that figure would have been around 10%.
Obesity is a very serious medical condition.
Obesity is a killer. It puts a strain on your heart, lungs, blood vessels, and joints. Your risk of getting diabetes goes up with your weight. The World Health Organisation (WHO) suggests that 58% of diabetes, 21% of heart disease, and up to 42% of certain cancers are caused by higher weight (BMI above 21).
Condemning our children to a life of sickness and early death
Basically, your chances of being sick and dying young go up with your weight. As obesity rates rise, our children face a life of ill health and short lifespan unknown since the rise of modern medicine.
It's a nightmare that is unfolding so slowly that few are noticing it even happening. Combined with the body image problems of a size zero obsessed fashion industry, we have a society that has a terminal weight problem.
What can we do about it?
The solutions are actually quite simple in theory. We build roads that give priority to cyclists and walkers, we force the food industry to reduce hidden sugar and fat, and we tax sugary and fatty foods. Of course, none of these things are going to happen any time soon in a capitalist economic system addicted to unhealthy food and big cars. That's a discussion for you to have with your politicians. Dr Jenni Zelin is hard at work doing a great job pushing for more cycle lanes in PEI
In the mean time, our Practice Nursing Team will be following the WHO advice. The WHO is urging family physician teams to intervene with healthy eating and lifestyle advice. Our team of nurses are already doing that. They have lists of patients who are obese, and they will be working through the list calling them to offer them support and advice. Our Practice Nurses can run a very successful weight management program with these patients.
The WHO wants to see this introduced nationally. It thinks 40,000 Canadians will be saved if it is. We agree. Our team is already hard at work doing this.
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