Manager, patients lament pending closure of Summit walk-in clinic

Oct 31, 2018 | 4:13 PM

KAMLOOPS — A walk-in clinic that’s provided health care for residents in Kamloops for more than 25 years is closing its doors.

The Summit Medical Centre in Sahali will see patients until Dec. 15. One doctor, Julie Anderson, is closing her practice while Dr. Victor De Kock is moving downtown. Other doctors at the clinic are retiring, and the loss of this walk-in clinic is about to put a further squeeze on the health care system in Kamloops. 

For years there have been line-ups — rain, shine, or cold — at the clinic, as patients without a doctor desperately try to get an appointment.

But starting in December, the clinic will close its doors for good.

“Basically we have a shortage of physicians and part of that is one of our doctors is ill so that’s not a good thing. The lease is up at the end of December,” Summit Medical Centre Office Manager Dan Perry says. “The impact on our patients is going to be felt seriously throughout the community.”

News of the closure is a huge blow to a community that’s been struggling through a severe doctor shortage. According to Perry, Summit Medical serves up to 10,000 patients per year. Appointments fill up fast every day, with dozens of patients lining up outside of the door in the morning.

“Today we’ll see about 110 (patients) and that’s four doctors and a nurse. This is a busier day than normal,” Perry says.

He adds that doctors at the clinic — some of whom are locums — are close to retirement and ready to close their practice. Others know they can make more money working at Royal Inland Hospital. 

“Ultimately a physician who works in a hospital environment has a set rate of pay, whereas the doctors here have another rate they see on a per patient basis, they turn around and then they have to pay for everything else that’s part of the clinic,” Perry says. “The physicians who work out of the hospital don’t have those expenses, so ultimately it’s significant.”

Patients seen today were told about the closure, and many were shocked and disappointed by the news. 

“Well I was a bit taken aback by it, because we’re all very, very dependent upon a medical doctor. The clinic shutting down is certainly a shock. We’re okay, but for a lot of people, I think it’d be a very critical issue,” says patient Jake Ootes.

Ootes drove in from Celista, and he feels both the current NDP and former Liberal governments have done a poor job luring doctors to Kamloops. 

“My concern is mostly what is the government doing about this, what is the government doing in terms of not necessarily attracting more doctors, but opening seats up to train more doctors?” Ootes asks.

Perry says even the residency program out of RIH isn’t helping in retaining doctors. 

“In the community of Kamloops, we can see that we aren’t getting a lot more physicians,” Perry says. “If you look at the residency program, it’s my estimate less than 10 per cent of the residents who come in here — graduate doctors — they spend two years here, most of them disappear.”

He says if the government steps up and fills the funding gap that’s keeping doctors away from walk-in clinics, it may open again, but he’s not hopeful that will happen.