Nakusp wants doctors in the neighbourhood, uses house as incentive to come to community
By Erin Perkins
The community of Nakusp will do nearly anything to protect their medical services at the Arrow Lakes Hospital, even buy a house.
Over the past five years the number of physicians in the community, which serves upwards of 5,000 people in the region, has dropped from three full-time and one part-time physician to one full-time and one three-quarter time physician.
Rather than wait for a more serious physician shortage and potential emergency room closure like the situation experienced in Princeton, BC over the September long weekend last year, the community of 1,500 has opted to make themselves even more attractive to potential medical staff with subsidized housing.
“We are so isolated,” said Mike George, Arrow Lakes Hospital Foundation chair. “With impassable roads and being so far from anywhere we have to stay open, it’s a matter of life and death.”
“We’ve been trying really hard over the past few years to get some more permanent physicians in here and it’s been really tough,” said Nakusp mayor Karen Hamling, who is also a director on the West Kootenay-Boundary Regional Hospital District board.
“We’ve come close to shutting our emergency room because of a lack of staff,” said Hamling. “Dr. (Norm) Lea has cancelled plans in his own life to stay and keep it open.”
And when the doctors to do come in, like the locums, they often need a place to say, she said.
Attracting and retaining doctors, even in a beautiful place like Nakusp, is a real problem. There are long work hours and you do work in isolation.
Physician recruitment is highly competitive for rural communities, said George.
Some communities offer things like free vehicles and free use of health clinics. George feels that little perks help the younger doctors get their feet under them after accumulating years of student loan debts.
“The competitive nature of attracting physicians to this community is in line with what northern communities have had to do. You need more to attract physicians to the area,” said Dr. Norm Lea, the one full-time physician in Nakusp who is both the chief of medical staff at the Arrow Lakes Hospital and operates his own family practice.
“(Living rurally) is not for everyone for sure. Rural medicine is a speciality in itself.”
“We are finding that graduates today don’t want to do a lot of on-call or emergency room work,” said Hamling, which is an unfortunate reality in rural communities.
Facing this ongoing difficulty, the Arrow Lakes Hospital Auxiliary and the Arrow Lakes Hospital Foundation joined together late last year to decide how to best address the issue of physician recruitment.
It helped that the foundation had recently received an undisclosed bequest from a Nakusp resident, and the group wanted to spend the money on something that would have a long-term benefit for local health care.
“(We wanted to use the money) to help us find a doctor for Nakusp. It is always very difficult attracting doctors to small rural communities,” said Ulli Mueller, foundation director and member of the housing committee.
“We thought if we were to offer housing it might help attract a doctor to our community and it did help.”
A young doctor, who is just finishing his residency in Golden, his young child, wife and parents are set to be the first residents of the home. They will be moving in this coming weekend.
The community also partially furnished the bedroom, dining room and living room so the young couple doesn’t have to move everything in until they are sure they are staying.
The doctor, who is an international medical grad, had 10 communities vying for his attention, said Lea. He said the new doctor “was awfully impressed with Nakusp” and committed to two years.
“I hope over time we will get this doctor in and he will come, he will like it here and he will want to stay long-term,” said Karen Marshall, a member of the Arrow Lakes Hospital Auxiliary and the housing committee.
Then he could look for his own house and we could use the house to recruit another doctor … (Having a house) is an easy way to come into town and not have to worry about (finding a place to live).”
When Lea arrived in Nakusp for a one-year residency 24 years ago he never left. He is a well-respected physician who is as impassioned about his community as the rest of the residents.
He is also hopeful that this new doctor will enjoy the welcome and opened reception the people of Nakusp have planned for him.
“We offer a lifestyle here so you need a number of physicians available to (have the time) to enjoy the lifestyle – three more would be great,” said Lea.
The $280,000 home was purchased by the two foundation and auxiliary under a corporation called Arrow Lakes Medical Housing Limited.
The home is located within walking distance of the hospital, has two bedrooms upstairs and two bedrooms down with an additional bachelor suite. So not only can it house one family but also any physician locums coming through too, said George.
The house is not completely rent free. The doctor will pay for his own utility costs in the first year and then will also pay rent in the second year.
