Health Care In Canada

Chronic diseases are preventable yet, based on WHO (2017), they kill 40 million people each year. In Canada, out of 248,000 deaths, 88% were attributed to chronic illnesses like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, cancer, chronic respiratory disease (WHO, 2014, p.45). The economic toll of these diseases is astounding as approximately 67% of the health care budget in Canada is spent on chronic diseases. “In a single year, they cost Canadians $190 billion; about $65 billion in treatment and $135 billion in lost productivity” (Elmslie, 2015, p.12). This detrimental impact is reflected in a recent study done by Doty, Squires, Sarnak, Schneider, and Shah (2017) where Canada’s health system ranked third last among other developed countries like France and the United

The Government of Canada (2012) defines primary health care as “an approach to health and a spectrum of services beyond the traditional health care system…Primary care is the element within primary health care that focusses on health care services, including health promotion, illness and injury prevention, and the diagnosis and treatment of illness and injury”. There are significant barriers that stand in the way of provision of first contact health services. The timely access to health care services remains a prominent issue in Canada. Most Canadians report having a regular doctor or place of care, but had issues accessing health care system as reported by Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI, 2017). According to an international health policy survey that compared the performance of 11 countries including Canada, “only 43% of Canadians report that they were able to get a same- or next-day appointment at their regular place of care the last time they needed medical attention — the lowest percentage of all countries” (CIHI, 2017, p. 6). This congestion is translated over to our emergency care services where the median wait time for medically