A Doctor On Call

Recent social media posts criticizing Town Hall bring a response from Mayor Greg Henley

There’s no doubt Oxford Town Councillors and town staff bear the brunt of public criticism. Usually it’s water off a duck’s back, and most are known to consciously avoid reading the posts made to social media as a way of avoiding undue stress. But the messages usually do seep through, in one way or another. This week, Mayor Greg Henley decided he’d had enough.

A bright red post to social media by resident Brenda Robinson, entitled “Medical Emergency,” called the public’s attention to the announced retirement of Oxford’s only in-town physician, Dr. Ronald Rondeau. Rondeau’s practice is located in the Oxford Medical Centre on Medawell Street, a building owned by the town.

In the post, Robinson says “town council is not actively recruiting a replacement” and suggests various actions the public can take to “let your voice be heard.”

Mayor Henley says he was surprised to see that post, and found it “so inappropriate.”

“It was totally irresponsible… Rondeau has patients who are chronically ill who need constant care. What kind of anxiety would Brenda’s post have cause for those people?”

“She could have phoned.”

The Mayor says he would have told her that “we knew he was leaving. We’ve been working on this for five years. And that would have been the end of it. But no, let’s start a big forest fire and see what happens.“

“I’ve spoken with Tory (Rushton, MLA Cumberland South) and like I said, we can push. And that’s all we can do. This idea that everybody’s sending an email to the CAO is just stupid. I mean, she wants a doctor here too. Her getting 100 emails isn’t going to help the cause at all.”

While Rondeau is retiring by March 2027, Henley says the practice he belongs to at the Springhill Hospital will step up to cover those patients — and hopefully that will include office hours at the Oxford medical centre: “…there’s no guarantee that they will run the Oxford Clinic two days a week. That being said, I think it behooves us to attempt to get another doctor to go into that practice and do those two days a week here in Oxford. Because we have people here that don’t have vehicles. We have mobility issues. It’s very close to the seniors complex there.”

As for why there isn’t a doctor ready to step into Rondeau’s office on the day he departs, Mayor Henley says Nova Scotia Health would not even consider recruiting a replacement until the retirement was announced. He says the bureaucracy didn’t see the urgency to begin looking: “it was made clear to me that ‘you have a physician. You’re not high on the priority list.'”

The search for a doctor to serve a community isn’t an Oxford-only matter. Nearly 60-thousand Nova Scotians remain on the wait list for family doctors, though the provincial government says that number is dropping. The ability of small towns to actively attract doctors is also somewhat delicate, says the Mayor, since “they don’t want communities poaching doctors from other communities…. Health Nova Scotia is doing the best it can to put doctors where they can.”

In her social media post, Robinson offered a list of actions that could be taken to help with recruitment. Many of them coincide with the Mayor’s views on helping an incoming physician see Oxford as a good place to live:

“They also want to have to come here. They have to want to come here. They cannot force, ‘Oh, you have to go here.’ It doesn’t work like that. We have to be attractive to them. And the foolishness you see on Facebook, certainly not going to attract anybody. I mean, we’ve got a nice little town here. Let’s put our best foot forward. We’ve got this major project happening next year. The whole of Main Street, totally redone. Let’s put the best foot forward and work to get a physician to look and say, ‘Yeah.’ You know, they’ve got four-wheelings handy, golf courses, skiing. Might be an ideal place, not far to the Northumberland Strait, beautiful beaches. Might be attractive.”

A suggestion was also posted that improving the medical centre building would serve as an incentive to an incoming physician or nurse practitioner. Mayor Henley says although the town has not budgeted money to spruce up the place, there was a plan put forth by Nova Scotia Health, which was withdrawn:

“Health Nova Scotia came in and they presented us with plans to do a complete renovation on Dr. Rondeau’s portion of the medical center. They were going to do it. They were going to put in a separate entrance. The whole, I mean, beautiful plans. Probably would have cost close to half a million dollars, just judging from what they were going to do. They were going to cover it. All of a sudden, ‘Oh, no, we’re not doing it now.’ But we didn’t get an explanation.”

The Mayor feels that Dr. Rondeau’s announced retirement will “move us a little up the ladder” with Nova Scotia Health. “We need a family practice physician.”

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From the Editor: It is unfortunate that the relationship between the Town and some members of the public is strained. Ultimately, the goal of recruiting a new doctor for Oxford is shared by those who do not see eye-to-eye on other matters. We can hope, and encourage, all those involved to be willing to work together for the benefit of the community at large.

Oxford’s elected representatives have their role to play in countless meetings, committees, serving as the connection between residents and the town administration, and ultimately directing town staff through the creation of bylaws and decision-making when required. Town staff are also seen —unfairly, in our opinion— as being overpaid and underworked. That perspective is a gross under-appreciation of the amount of work downloaded on municipalities from both the provincial and federal governments. This is a small town, with a small staff, and no shortage of things that must be done.

What of our community volunteers? We have some amazing folks who do an enormous amount of unrecognized work for the benefit of us all, from Bunny Trail stewards, flower bed maintainers, food bank and pantry supporters, and community organization leaders. There is only so much a town with our population can take on, sustainably. The vacancies for public representatives on some town committees have existed for years, with no-one stepping up to fill the void. [How to become a volunteer in Oxford]

Those who are calling for Town Council to take action have an opportunity to make things happen. There are physician recruitment and retention committees operating across the province, all working with provincial partners to attract medical professionals to their communities. Nova Scotia Health’s Community Recruitment Toolkit is available to help guide people who have a vested interest and the desire to be a part of the process. Rather than put even more work on the shoulders of those who already are stretched thin, consider your role in effecting change.