Shortage of Canadian Doctors Symptoms of High Tuition Fees
The ominous prospect of large amounts of debt is keeping lower-income Canadians away from the medical sector, an article from the Financial Post reported last Wednesday.
With medical school tuition in the $15,000-to-$$$19,000-a-year range, a career as a physician is financially daunting to many Canadians. This can be attributed to the deregulation of tuition fees in the mid 90’s. Between 1996 and 2001, medical school tuition rose 132 per cent.
While students from rural communities and low-income families might be motivated to become family physicians to service their communities, they have to face the stark reality that, since deregulation, provincial student grant programs have shriveled and student-loan programs have caps that don’t even cover the tuition costs, let alone books, supplies and living expenses.
Although there is a shorter residency period to become a family physician, they will often make as little as half of the salaries of those who choose to specialize. Coupled with provincial policies (excluding Saskatchewan) that require students to begin paying back their loan when they graduate and enter residency, the result is a high demand for family practitioners in Canada.
Approximately 5 million Canadians, or 17 per cent of the country’s population say they don’t have a family practitioner.
Critics say deferring loan payments until after residency will encourage more students to pursue medical careers in Canada.
