Tommy Douglas was the person behind Medicare. It was created with good intentions for the Canadian population and was responsible for meeting basic health needs of the general population. Today the system is better recognized as the Canadian Health Act.
However, the Canadian health care system is not in the same condition as it used to be once. Now we understand that Canadians are proud of there health care systems but they are most certainly worried about it’s future.
In 2010 the common wealth fund report card showed that Canada ranked 6 out of 7. While having said this the Canadian population has seen a harsh change. The patient population is going through a cultural change and catering these culturally diverse patients having unique health care needs, while on the other hand we see an aging baby boomer population and geographical challenges for different communities across the country.
The health care system would have catered to the needs of the population in the old times but this time around they have to increase awareness of how things are changing and adopt to the change rapidly. However, as health care has become more complex and creative solutions are required to catered to everyone’s diverse needs.
Another important issue in the health care system of Canada is that of sustainability. Which refers to the problem of maintaining equitable quality health care. This implies having mechanisms to ensure that Canadians, irrespective of their ability to pay, will have continued access to prompt, technologically current, competent and compassionate health care that addresses the full range of their health needs (quote). Currently, there are contrasting views towards the sustainability of the current Canadian healthcare system.
We see that there are a lot of factors that would deem the health care system as unsustainable. Which includes; population aging, inflation, increases in size of population, enrichment of health care services and cost of dying.
These factors have resulted in further problems; long waits in emergency departments for unavailable hospital beds; delays in cataract, joint replacement and cardiac surgery; and the unavailability of needed home care services.
Solving these problems would require additional resources to be spent on the health care system. These problems do put a huge load on the health care system of Canada. Without the necessary resources to counteract the increased “loads” placed on the healthcare system, we can expect to encounter a failing situation. This will include lack of timely access to family physicians and specialist care/treatment, lack of ER access and an aging population with end-of-life issues and lack of access to palliative care.
The solution to the problem would be to;
see the federal government matching new health expenditures by the provinces, in some fixed proportion. Currently, both levels of government accuse the other of being responsible for health care delivery problems and for inadequacies in funding, while failing to address the problem.
A solution would begin with the provincial and federal governments agreeing to establish the current funding levels as a base situation and instituting mechanisms to ensure that base funding committed to healthcare is actually spent on healthcare. A solution must also ensure that both levels of government acknowledge their responsibility to provide adequate funding for universal access to needed physician, hospital and other health services, without imposing on patients’ financial barriers to care.
