(June 18, 2025) By: Greg McGrath-Goudie, SooToday.com<\/p>\n
MPP Bill Rosenberg compared the ongoing bidding and fighting for doctors to ‘the Hunger Games’<\/em><\/p>\n Picture this.<\/p>\n You’ve just had a stroke.<\/p>\n But when you show up at your local emergency room, the doors are closed due to a doctor shortage.<\/p>\n Along the North Shore of Lake Huron, it’s a worry\u00a0that community members live with, and local health-care providers are scrambling to avoid\u00a0\u2013 bringing doctors from as far away as Nova Scotia to keep emergency rooms\u00a0open.<\/p>\n For Thessalon\u2019s Mary-Jane Thompson, it’s a problem\u00a0that was important enough to put her small town hospital centre stage in Queen\u2019s Park, when she travelled to Toronto to speak with the Ontario Health Coalition in late May.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I had a stroke in 2003, Thessalon\u00a0Hospital saved my life,\u201d Thompson said at the press conference in Toronto.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd when my husband had a heart attack in 2013, he was stabilized in Thessalon Hospital and is alive today because of it.”<\/p>\n \u201cWe are two of thousands over the years who are alive and well because of the hospital. Now our little hospital is in serious trouble,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n In the span of just a few years, Thessalon has lost its lone family doctor and the hospital\u2019s four inpatient beds, on top of contending with sporadic and continual\u00a0emergency room closures \u2013 an issue faced in nearby St. Joseph Island as well.<\/p>\n Across April and May alone, there were a full eight days where the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital was closed and\u00a0one day where the Richard’s Landing hospital on St. Joseph Island was closed.\u00a0Those closures left residents with a lengthy trip to Sault Ste. Marie or Blind River to access emergency care.<\/p>\n The current situation is a far cry from what the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital used to be \u2013 which Thompson hopes can be restored for her small town of 1,400 people.<\/p>\n \u201cWe had family doctors and everything here in Thessalon, pretty much until COVID,\u201d she told SooToday<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cYou could actually stay in the hospital, and because (Algoma Manor Nursing Home) is right beside that, it was very convenient, too, for families,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cIf their loved ones were near death, then they\u2019d bring them over to the hospital. Then people could come and be with them.\u201d<\/p>\n Thompson hasn\u2019t taken the hospital\u2019s decline lying down: she\u2019s helped organize protests, engaged local politicians and health officials, and collected dozens of stories from community members \u2013 which she took with her on her trip to Queen’s Park.<\/p>\n As she advocates for better health-care in her community, local health-care providers are doing everything they can to keep hospital doors open.<\/p>\n ‘A wicked problem’<\/strong><\/p>\n The hospitals in Thessalon, St. Joseph Island, and Blind River are overseen by the North Shore Health Network, a local health-care organization that\u2019s had to bring doctors in from all over to keep emergency rooms running.<\/p>\n The area\u2019s hospitals are supported by local family clinics where doctors sign on to a rural northern physician group agreement and each fills a certain number of shifts at local emergency rooms.<\/p>\n Currently only four of the available 13.5 positions meant to support St. Joseph Island and Thessalon are filled. For Thessalon, which lost its last family doctor in 2022, zero of the three locally available physician posts are filled.<\/p>\n As a result, NSHN relies heavily on locum doctors, or temporary physicians, from out of town to cover 70 per cent of its emergency room shifts each and every month.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s \u2013 in a very strict sense of the term \u2013 a wicked problem,\u201d Tim Vine, CEO of NSHN, told SooToday<\/em>.<\/p>\n Every month, Vine and his staff scramble to fill the majority of NSHN\u2019s emergency room shifts, which are part of a locum physician\u2019s responsibilities when they come to town.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got somewhere between 10 and 12 shifts a month covered. The rest of the 30 shifts would be covered by the locums,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Faced with an uphill battle to staff its emergency rooms, NSHN\u00a0works with locum doctors to keep its hospitals afloat.<\/p>\n \u201cWe’re in constant email contact with our book of locum physicians, trying to get them to sign on,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe increase the frequency of that communication as we get closer to an impending closure \u2013 we’ll often follow up with text messages and that sort of thing.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite his team’s efforts to juggle coverage \u2013 sometimes offering to swap shifts around to make emergency room schedules work \u2013 Vine said they don\u2019t always succeed.<\/p>\n On those days, emergency rooms have no choice but to close.<\/p>\n NSHN recently hired\u00a0a physician recruitment coordinator to bring permanent family doctors to the area, but smaller communities struggle to compete with larger municipalities, which can offer much more lucrative\u00a0incentives for family physicians to move to town.<\/p>\n \u201cYou’ve probably heard of communities like Haliburton, that’s offering an $80,000 signing bonus,\u201d Vine said.<\/p>\n \u201cOur communities can’t support that level of payment, and we certainly aren’t funded for . . . any incentives for physicians in that way.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s created a situation where the province\u2019s smaller communities face an even more daunting version of the doctor shortage faced all over Ontario.<\/p>\n \u201cWe’re just bidding up all of these services in a way that’s really unsustainable,\u201d Vine said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt means that places like us, who don’t have the funding, communities that don’t have the tax base to be able to offer those types of things, get left further and further behind.\u201d<\/p>\n And it\u2019s not only emergency rooms paying the price.<\/p>\n During the pandemic, Thessalon\u2019s four inpatient beds \u2013 spread across only two rooms \u2013 closed due to concerns about keeping patients safe, and they never reopened.<\/p>\n According to Vine, reopening the beds could create a situation where it\u2019s even more difficult to keep the emergency room\u00a0open.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are getting a lot of locums that aren’t interested in doing 24-hour hospitalist service. They’re really just there to do the emergency department service,\u201d Vine said.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we ask them to do both, my worry would be we’d have a number of doctors who \u2013 that’s not their forte, that’s not their area \u2013 they would simply stop coming and put us further behind in being able to maintain that level of service.\u201d<\/p>\n As a result, North Shore Health Network is left scrambling to keep its emergency rooms open, actively recruiting doctors against communities that\u00a0can offer larger incentives, and trying not to deter the doctors who actually do come by asking them to step outside their comfort zones.<\/p>\n \u2018I think some people are going to move out\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n As the North Shore Health Network struggles to keep its\u00a0hospital doors open, community members in Thessalon worry every day about what might happen if they\u2019re faced with an emergency.<\/p>\n One of those people is Martin Hamilton, who\u2019s relied on the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital in critical moments over the last several years.<\/p>\n Afflicted with prostate cancer, Hamilton had to drink plenty of water for scheduled biopsies in Sault Ste. Marie \u2013 but after he arrived back home in Thessalon he found his bladder blocked on one occasion due to the size of his prostate.<\/p>\n \u201cDown I go to Thessalon\u00a0Hospital, the doctor and nurses got a catheter in. I was back home in half an hour, feeling good,\u201d he told SooToday<\/em>.<\/p>\n A couple years later, Martin faced the same problem.<\/p>\n This time, the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital couldn\u2019t get a catheter in, but they were able to call ahead to the Sault Area Hospital, arrange care upon Martin’s arrival, and give him medication before rushing him to Sault Ste. Marie.<\/p>\n \u201cI was awful lucky there was a doctor here,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n \u201cThey raced me to the Sault, and they had the room\u00a0waiting for me there, which was good.\u201d<\/p>\n Hamilton\u2019s wife, Kim, has also relied on the local hospital in dire moments.<\/p>\n One one occasion when she struggled with abdominal pain, Kim ultimately learned her appendix was going to burst after a trip to the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital.<\/p>\n \u201cIf she would have stayed home a bit longer, she wouldn\u2019t be here,\u201d Hamilton said.<\/p>\n His family\u2019s health-care close calls have led him to worry about what it will mean for the town.<\/p>\n \u201cI think some people are going to move out, because they’ll move to the Sault where there’s a hospital, right?\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you wake up in the middle of the night, like me, what do you do? It\u2019s an hour to go to the Sault.\u201d<\/p>\n Thompson has been gathering stories like Hamilton\u2019s to demonstrate how important hospitals are to smaller communities like Thessalon.<\/p>\n She recently had coffee with an older woman who wasn’t as lucky as the Hamiltons. She\u00a0had to leave Thessalon to access urgent care when she experienced an issue with her heart.<\/p>\n Although the town was filled with first responders for the North Shore Firefighter Challenge from April 25-27, the hospital was closed throughout that span due to a shortage of doctors to staff the emergency department.<\/p>\n \u201cThe town was packed full of people and emergency vehicles, and the hospital was closed, and she thought she was maybe\u00a0having a heart attack,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n \u201cShe called the ambulance, and they said the hospital\u2019s closed,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n \u201cThey said they\u2019d pick her up, and they took her to Blind River. That’s the first level, and then if it’s worse than that, then they’d go (elsewhere).\u201d<\/p>\n Watching the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital slowly downgrade from a place with inpatient beds to a place that can\u2019t consistently keep its emergency room doors open has sparked Thompson into action.<\/p>\n Once \u201ca thriving resource in our community, it has since been diminished to what\u00a0amounts to a transfer site,\u201d Thompson said during the press conference at Queen\u2019s Park.<\/p>\n Thompson has engaged politicians at the local and provincial level, and also helped organize a protest where over 100 residents rallied to save the Thessalon\u00a0Hospital, with many holding signs calling for more doctors to come to the community.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was designed for this community \u2013 for people who have paid their taxes and worked for the hospital and then at the end of their life be in this community and die in this community, so their families can be around to visit,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n The path forward, however, isn\u2019t entirely clear.<\/p>\n \u2018There\u2019s no silver bullet\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n Asked about what NSHN needs, Vine said \u201cthere\u2019s no silver bullet\u201d to address its ongoing issues.<\/p>\n \u201cIt involves money, for sure, but money is not the thing that’s going to solve this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt involves, I think, a lot more coordination at the system level about \u2013 what are the reasonable services to have, and where should they be located? How are they funded? What are the expectations?\u201d<\/p>\n One part of the answer is more doctors \u2013 but that\u2019s a longer term solution.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need more physicians in the province of Ontario \u2013 they take about six years once they start medical school to be ready, to be fully independent providing service,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need to grow medical school enrolment, but that’s not going to solve the problem today.\u201d<\/p>\n When she travelled to Queen\u2019s Park last month, Thompson was\u00a0one of many who raised concern about hospitals around the province, when she joined the Ontario Health Coalition to attend the Ontario legislature\u2019s question period and host a press conference.<\/p>\n Attendees spoke about similar conditions in Durham, where emergency room hours have been limited and inpatient beds have been closed, as well as in Chelsey, where the emergency room is only open five days per week.<\/p>\n Some took direct aim at the provincial government, such as Ontario Health Network\u2019s Natalie Mehra, who said the group tracked 1,117 emergency room closures in Ontario through 2024.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a political choice. It’s not a necessity,\u201d said Mehra, executive director with Ontario Health Coalition.<\/p>\n Mehra also took issue with how the Minister of Health, Sylvia Jones, spoke during question period.<\/p>\n \u201cI heard the health minister in question period today. I thought her tone was completely inappropriate, nasty and contemptuous of people who are asking questions about what is an absolutely critical issue in communities.\u201d<\/p>\n When she travelled to Queen\u2019s Park, Thompson told SooToday<\/em> she hoped to meet with Jones to discuss the issues Thessalon faces \u2013 but it never came to fruition.<\/p>\n \u201cShe wouldn’t. She never replied, and she wouldn’t meet with any of us,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n Another member of the Progressive Conservatives \u2013 Bill Rosenberg, the newly elected MPP for Algoma\u2013Manitoulin \u2013 spoke with SooToday<\/em> about the provincial government\u2019s plans to bolster health care in the area.<\/p>\n Rosenberg, the former mayor of Thessalon, said it\u2019s going to take time to address the issues NSHN faces.<\/p>\n In 2022, for example, the government approved an additional 30 seats and 41 residency positions for the Northern Ontario School of Medicine, but those students won\u2019t be fully-fledged doctors until six years after they enrol.<\/p>\n \u201cWe’ve spent the last eight years \u2013 there’s been 100,000 nurses hired, 15,000 doctors \u2013 but there’s been a lot of retirements,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need bodies, and I think with the local commitment to NOSM and other education facilities, we’re going to increase students going into the system.\u201d<\/p>\n Rosenberg was leery of incentives communities are putting up to compete one another for doctors, and hoped that doctors educated in the north will choose to stay.<\/p>\n \u201cThat’s like The Hunger Games almost, right? That undermines the whole system,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you can educate somebody in the north, will they stay in the north? There’s a better chance, for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n He didn’t offer\u00a0any\u00a0short term solutions to the problem plaguing hospitals across Ontario – including in his own riding.<\/p>\n \u201cI know it’s hard for people to step back and wait for that,\u201d he said. \u201cI think a short term solution is what we’re really struggling with, right?\u201d<\/p>\n In the meantime, he encouraged community members to continue pushing for solutions.<\/p>\n \u201cKeep advocating for our area. It’s the most important thing they can do,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe people we have are very committed, and we don’t want to overload them or burn them out, but if we keep advocating, I think it’s the best . . . we can do right now as the budget rolls out and we see where these programs are taking us.\u201d<\/p>\n