Canada: Toronto doctor’s six big ideas for better healthcare

Dr. Danielle Martin, named one of Canada’s most powerful doctors by The Medical Post, has written a book 'Better Now: Six Big Ideas to Improve Health Care for All Canadians'.

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An advocate of universal healthcare, in 2014, she presented her views based on a study of health care systems in other countries before a powerful group of US politicians, including US Senator Bernie Sanders, the committee's Chair, media reported.

A post on Martin’s Facebook under the title Details said, “Dr. Martin offers a timely and insightful perspective on Canada’s commitment to providing health care as a right to all people. The U.S. health care system has a great deal to learn from Canada and from Better Now.” – U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders

Video of her testimony went viral on YouTube, with more than 1.4 million views.

The six ideas outlined in her book focus on the delivery of healthcare system, include : Canadians need to have regular relationship-based primary health care; prescription drugs should be brought under medicare; reduction of unnecessary tests and interventions; reduction of wait times to improve quality of heath care; implementing basic income guarantee; development of successful solutions across the country.

Martin not only strongly advocates regular access to a family doctor or other primary care provider for the Canadians but also insists that there should be good relationship between the two.

She also talks about the difficulty in getting timely appointment with a family doctor,which often leads to increased use of walk-in clinics which, though they provide convenient access to healthcare, lacked relationship-based healthcare.

Martin said that the communication between the family physicians and the healthcare system needs to improve.

Martin suggested in her book that instead of surgeons keeping their own wait list, a shared or a centralized list would enable the patients to be seen by the next available doctor.

She tweeted, “If specialists came together to share one wait list, patients cld be seen a lot faster”.

Martin said that “team-based” care should involve not only doctors but nurse practitioners, dietitians, physiotherapists and other health-care workers.

Martin also believed unnecessary tests and interventions often impede the health care system as these tests can do more harm than good to the person’s health.

(Reporting by Asha Bajaj)

Image: Dr. Danielle Martin Twitter