GET 'EM: Nova Scotia sprints ahead with plan to woo expat physicians

Nova Scotia’s newly formed recruitment office for healthcare professionals has already won brownie points from the province’s doctors for its quick work in recruiting three new specialists with ties to the province. Healthcare professionals in other parts of the country have also noticed and many have reached out to the office expressing interest in moving to Nova Scotia, Dr. Kevin Orrell, CEO of Nova Scotia’s Office of Health Care Professionals Recruitment, told CBC News. But he’s currently focused on repatriating Nova Scotia natives working elsewhere as doctors, nurses, continuing care assistants, paramedics and other healthcare roles. "These things are really exciting when we start to hear them—this is what we're hoping will come out of this new office of recruitment," said Dr. Heather Johnson, president of Doctors Nova Scotia, which represents physicians in the province. "We want Nova Scotia to be a place where people can come where the barriers are minimal, where we do our due diligence, where we get physicians and other health-care professionals here working as easily for them as it can be.” Read: B.C. offers incentives like child care to recruit and retain healthcare workers So far, the new office has succeeded in recruiting two anesthesiologists and a psychiatrist for jobs in Cape Breton, located at the eastern end of the province. Dr. Orrell said his office has adopted an approach that calls for making concrete offers to physicians, even if they’re months away from being able to come to the province. The three new recruits, for example, are not scheduled to start until sometime in 2022 because they’re still in school. "They're thrilled to have the security now of knowing that at the completion of their fellowship year, they will have a job in Cape Breton where they wanted to go," said Dr. Orrell. These specialists had approached the province 15 months ago as they were starting their last year of school but that outreach didn’t go anywhere. "I don't want to be overly critical of the process that was in place because a great deal of it had to do with budget and things like that," said Dr. Orrell. "I do think that we're fortunate that these people who had some connection to Cape Breton wanted to remain on the list and were not attracted elsewhere in that timeframe." Dr. Orrell’s office was launched at the start of September as part of newly-minted Premier Tim Houston’s plan to reform the province’s health system. Just one day after Houston and his cabinet were sworn into office, the new premier dismissed the CEO of the Nova Scotia Health Authority, got rid of the agency’s board of directors and appointed a four-person leadership team—which includes Dr. Orrell—to streamline management and overhaul the health system. Read: Nova Scotia premier dismisses CEO of health authority, abolishes board of directors Dr. Orrell said his office is doing more than wooing healthcare professionals back to the province. It’s also offering support to help healthcare professionals thrive in their business. Two new family physicians, for example, were struggling to set up their practice in the three-month window they were given and were worried about having to go from a salary to a fee-for-service payment plan. To give them a hand, the province offered each of the two doctors a salary compensation model for one year. "Basically we extended that so they had a comfort zone and they didn't have to feel as if they would be unable to make a living in the three-month timeframe," said Dr. Orrell, who noted that two doctors were doing a great job of taking patients off the province’s waitlist. Read: N.L. doctors say physician shortage will get worse if N.S. boosts its health system Dr. Orrell’s own daughter is an example of Nova Scotia doctors coming back home. After practising as a physiatrist in Saskatoon, she signed a contract in Cape Breton this summer for a role that had been vacant for eight years. “If someone makes a conscious decision to return to the community where they grew up, very often that person is likely to stay for the 30 to 35 years of their practice," said Dr. Orrell. "I think (for) any Nova Scotian willing to repatriate, I think we can expedite the process by which they return." Succession planning is also a priority for the recruitment office, which is looking at the province’s aging medical workforce. The province needs to be more forward-thinking in its hiring and can’t continue its previous practice of turning healthcare professionals away because there’s no position for them today. "I witnessed during my years as an orthopedic surgeon, many times communities were left very vulnerable because the retirements occurred abruptly and there was no one in the wings to fill those positions,” said Dr. Orrell. “Before, we would refuse somebody for that community just simply because there isn't a position." Dr. Johnson said having a plan that anticipates retirement and absences makes sense. As an example, she points to what can happen to a specialty with four practitioners when one of the group gets sick or retires. "If you have five people, then you can maintain a better work-life balance,” she said. “So it provides that flexibility so you don't tax the people that are remaining.” Read: NLMA president lauds Nova Scotia's physician recruitment plan

GET 'EM: Nova Scotia sprints ahead with plan to woo expat physicians

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