Dear Editor:
In June of this year many residents in and around the Elora area received a letter from a doctor who practices at the Elora Medical Centre. We were told that this doctor was leaving the practice and that they would do everything they could to retain another doctor for this practice.
On Sept. 7 we received a follow up letter stating that a doctor could be not be retained and were given some prices which would be charged if renewing prescriptions and if we wanted our records copied for our use. I have been a client of the Elora Medical Centre for 44 years and have been given no priority on continuing to receive assistance at that centre.
We were also told that our only options in seeking medical attention would be to go to the walk-in clinic at Walmart or go to the emergency room at Groves hospital. Anyone who has been to either of those places know that it is virtually impossible to get service within a decent period of time.
The charge for renewing a prescription is going to be $15/prescription. The charge for getting our records was up to $40. Imagine being a senior, a person on ODSP or Ontario Works having to pay these extra fees out of their fixed income.
Does the doctor get the OHIP fee on top of the $15? Does he get a OHIP fee paid for having our records copied? I could take those records and copy them myself for a lot less than $40!
In addition, anyone who has more than one prescription could be paying exorbitant fees on a monthly basis.
One person I talked to did not receive any correspondence from the medical centre and tried for three weeks to get through to the office to get her prescription renewed.
Once she finally got through, she was told she had no doctor and that she would have to pay $15 to get her prescription renewed. Since she had no notice that she had no doctor, she asked for the fee to be waived. She was told that the fee was the doctor’s fee and the office couldn’t waive the fee.
I personally am on a program administered by the nurse practitioner (NP) in the office but cannot follow up with the NP on this even though the doctor had nothing to do with putting me on the program.
The NP can take appointments, prescribe tests and meds but can’t continue to see the patients in this office. This is ridiculous. The whole situation is not right.
Linda McFadden,
Elora