EDMONTON - Alberta's doctors and nurses say they have questions and concerns about the government's plan to off-load underperforming hospitals to third-party operators.

Danielle Larivee, a vice-president at the United Nurses of Alberta, said nurses are “very alarmed” by hospital transfers she said could negatively affect care and drive critical health-care workers from the province.

Like Parks, Larivee said the worry is the restructuring will lead to more bureaucracy and less co-ordination across the system.

“We’re not seeing any evidence at all to support the idea that this is about improving access to care, about improving services or even about saving money,” said Larivee in an interview.

“If we’re not saving money and not making care better, why are we doing it?”

  • Avid Amoeba
    10•3 months ago

    Earlier this month, Smith told a United Conservative Party town hall in Drayton Valley, Alta., that she will look to transfer authority in some cases in an effort to create competition and “fear” among providers.

    The policy shift would be part of a bigger plan first announced last year by Smith to dismantle Alberta Health Services, or AHS, the provincial authority tasked with delivering front-line care.

    🤦‍♂️

    • @[email protected]English
      6•3 months ago

      What she knows and they don’t is that there is never competition between commercial providers of healthcare. America’s been trying that experiment for years.

      What it gets - since there is never enough healthcare - is massive disparity in public and private services (if any public ones are left) based on your HMO’s ability to pay.

      This is a challenge to our charter.