Rumours circulating in the community that the nurse-practitioner-led Huntsville Health Care Clinic located in the Huntsville Public Library Annex building is closing are not true, said Janine van den Heuvel, Executive Director of the Algonquin Family Health Team.
“We’re not closing. We don’t have plans to close,” she said. “We are actively seeking funding to help us grow and be permanent. The clinic doesn’t have its own permanent funding right now,” said van den Heuvel.
She said the clinic which is a partnership between the Algonquin Family Health Team and the Town of Huntsville (which provides the building), is currently funded through a series of grants “but obviously given the need that we know we have just by the amount of phone calls that we are receiving, we’d like to grow this into a permanent, five-day-a-week clinic and for that, we are going to need permanent and ongoing funding.” Van den Heuvel said several grant applications have been submitted to the province under different streams and programs, the first of which should be known in October.
The clinic works by appointment only three days per week and services patients in the area who do not have a family doctor. Van den Heuvel said while the clinic does not take patients on permanently it does often see patients return for a follow-up, particularly if they haven’t seen a physician in a long time and present with multiple issues.
The clinic sees an average of 53 patients per week. Since it opened last February, it has seen a total of 1,544 patients. Van den Heuvel noted that there are several thousand community members who do not have a family doctor so the need is great and growing. “We don’t like to put that number out there because it’s a bit of a scary number but the wait list is 2+ years and with physicians’ retirements probably pending, just given the age of family physicians that we’ve got in Huntsville, we are looking at several thousand people on a waitlist and it’s going to take several years to attach them to a family physician given the current capacity,” she said.
When asked what members of the public can do to support the clinic, van den Heuvel said: “We’re trying to sustain ourselves with public funds, provincial public funds, to support an unattached patient clinic so any advocacy with the province is helpful, just understanding the need. Publicly funded primary care is still an important… (service) and deserves to be funded in a sustainable way.”
Huntsville Mayor Nancy Alcock said council is aware of the clinic’s importance as a way of avoiding costly ER visits for non-emergency health issues and helping those who do not have a family physician. “This is a really important clinic for all of us so we’re playing whatever role we can to assist in any way.” Alcock said she has spoken to MPP Graydon Smith to make him aware of the situation and she said he’s had a tour of the clinic. “We’re doing what we can to ensure that whatever contacts are being made that are important for that ongoing funding, are being made.”
Alcock said the number of people who no longer have primary health care in the community is growing “and quickly growing and so that concerns all of us. So we’re trying every different approach we can,” said Alcock, referring to showing Northern Ontario School of Medicine students the community and encouraging them to return to Huntsville once they graduate as well as lobbying the province for funding dollars for initiatives such as the clinic. “We’re doing everything we can, using the channels that we can.”
MPP Graydon Smith’s office indicated that they are aware of the issue and are working on it.
If you don’t have a family physician and your health issue is not an emergency, here are some of your care options outside of the Huntsville Hospital ER: https://www.mahc.ca/en/services/where-to-get-care-muskoka.aspx
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Paul Johnston says
I followed upas to the medical services available in Huntsville. here in Huntsville. We are in dire need of a local family doctor. Another situation was our neighbour burnt their arm pretty badly and went to Huntsville hospital but after waiting in excess of four hours he was told it would be at least another 8/10 hours to see a doctor. So he left. Then yesterday we needed a specialized needle and made an appointment at recently opened Huntsville Healthcare mediacal office attached to the library. She received the shot and she thanked them but was told they would be most likely closing as the province will not provide continuing funding. This medical situation is a total mess and now even though this province has a budget surplus we citizens cannot get adequate and timely medical care in Huntsville. The Huntsville Health Clinic must be funded.
Graydon as our MPP, you must address this deteriorating medical situation before it is too late.
Shane Baker says
My wife and I echo Paul Johnston’s sentiments. The loss of our physician after over 30 years living in Huntsville/Lake of Bays has been a real shock to us. That said, the Huntsville clinic has met our needs over the last few months. To close it and be faced with using the Emergency department unnecessarily doesn’t help the situation at all. Thank you again to Huntsville Council for taking the initiative. To MPP Graydon Smith we really need you to support the several thousand of us in this unfortunate situation with financial support for this clinic!