MY TAKE

HAVE YOUR SAY IN FIXING HEALTHCARE

Dr Tara Kiran at the launch of the first OurCare survey.

By SHAGORIKA EASWAR

It began with a discussion on Nordic noir. My friend said she was watching a film in that genre. I asked how she was able to stomach it.

There was such a big hooha over The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, etc., but I just never got into either the books or the movies. I think it’s to do with our weather, I tell her – we have enough grey and cold days for real in Canada to want to watch something with a wash of blue-grey over everything!

She urged me to look beyond the gloom and the gray, praising it as “television gold and in the grandest tradition of story telling”. And recommended a few titles. I promised, with some trepidation, to give them a shot.

From that, it was an easy hop-skip-and-jump to the social, welfare, medical, educational and political systems of the Nordic countries and some European ones, too. Both of us are fans, so no disagreement there.

A couple of weeks later, another friend said her son and daughter-in-law were considering moving to the Netherlands – their healthcare and public transit being the major draws.

“They don’t want to drive or own cars,” she said.

Which got us talking about how we moved continents to raise our kids in Canada and now many young people are looking to other horizons.

Which is, of course, in the natural order of things. Kids spread their wings. They leave the nest. Leaving the country is a natural extension. But to leave a country celebrated for its public healthcare because another country promises better is akin to giving Canada a failing grade.

But then it’s not like we aren’t aware of the cracks in the system.

A recent study shows that Switzerland has nearly 65% more doctors and much shorter wait times than Canada, despite spending roughly the same amount on health care.

“Switzerland’s universal healthcare system delivers significantly better results than Canada’s in terms of wait times, access to health professionals like doctors and nurses, and patient satisfaction” found the new study published by the Fraser Institute, an independent, nonpartisan Canadian policy think-tank.

“Despite its massive price tag, Canada’s healthcare system lags behind many other countries with universal health care,” said Yanick Labrie, senior fellow at the Fraser Institute and author of Building Responsive and Adaptive Health-Care Systems in Canada: Lessons from Switzerland.

The study highlights how Switzerland’s universal healthcare system consistently outperforms Canada on most metrics tracked by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

In 2022, the latest year of available data, despite Canada (11.5 per cent of GDP) and Switzerland (11.9 per cent) spending close to the same amount on health care, Switzerland had 4.6 doctors per thousand people compared to 2.8 in Canada. In other words, Switzerland had 64.3 per cent more doctors than Canada (on a per-thousand people basis).

Switzerland also had 4.4 hospital beds per thousand people compared to 2.5 for Canada – Switzerland (8th) outranked Canada (36th) on this metric out of 38 OECD countries with universal health care.

Likewise, 85.3 per cent of Swiss surveyed by the Commonwealth Fund reported being able to obtain a consultation with a specialist within two months. By comparison, only 48.3 per cent of Canadians experienced a similar wait time.

Beyond medical resources and workforce, patient satisfaction diverges sharply between the two countries, as 94 per cent of Swiss patients report being satisfied with their healthcare system compared to just 56 per cent in Canada.

“Switzerland shows that a universal health care system can reconcile efficiency and equity – all while being more accessible and responsive to patients’ needs and preferences,” Labrie said. “Policymakers in Canada who hope to improve Canada’s broken healthcare system should look to more successful universal healthcare countries like Switzerland.”

Grant’s Desi Achiever Dr Tara Kiran (February 2025) is working to fix the inequities in accessing primary care in Canada.

“There have been many studies over decades that show that despite universal medicare, we still see inequities in health and health access,” she had said. “I am focused on social and policy innovation in my work. If we want everyone to have access, we have to think differently, do things differently.” 

The Fidani Chair in Improvement and Innovation at the University of Toronto and Vice-Chair of Quality and Innovation at the Department of Family and Community Medicine practices family medicine at the St. Michael’s Hospital Academic Family Health Team.

She develops and tests solutions to make healthcare more inclusive and more effective.

To identify health issues in communities and workshop solutions that would help remove some of the barriers we find, Dr Kiran launched OurCare, a national, public engagement initiative to co-create the blueprint for a stronger, more equitable primary care system in Canada – a blueprint that can be used by government to inform and enact reforms, and by professional organizations and the public to advocate for change.

It was the largest such exercise in primary care in Canada, with national surveys, citizenship panels, roundtables with Indigenous youth, and panels on newcomer health in different languages, etc. They heard from those directly affected. Their final report brought consistent themes across the country to the attention of physicians as a vision forward.

The results were influential and were responsible for the oft cited statistics of  over 6.5 million people in Canada not having a family doctor.

The second OurCare survey has recently been launched in partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. This one is focused on understanding whether people’s experiences of care match up to the OurCare standard.

And they want to hear from you. The survey aims to gather feedback on your experiences with primary care. By sharing your voice, you’ll help researchers understand what’s needed for a stronger, more equitable health care system in Canada.

Accessing healthcare shouldn’t be a challenge. Whether you’re struggling to access a family doctor, facing long wait times, or navigating a confusing system, they want to hear your story.

Your input will help the team improve the future of primary care. 

Over 1 in 5 Canadians lack access to basic health care. Are you one of them? The OurCare Survey is your chance to share your experience and help shape a system that works for everyone. Your voice matters. Take the survey:

The survey should take ~10-15 minutes and is open until July 9, 2025. Participation is confidential.

For more information, visit our care.ca.

Find a family doctor at www.ourcare.ca/find-a-family-doctor.  

Also, check out Dr Tara Kiran’s new podcast, Primary Focus: It’s available wherever people get their podcasts and is a space where they are exploring solutions to the current crisis.