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Vancouver Off-Topic / Current EventsThe off-topic forum for Vancouver, funnies, non-auto centered discussions, WORK SAFE. While the rules are more relaxed here, there are still rules. Please refer to sticky thread in this forum.
It's a balancing act, and its not one that I envy.
I fully agree that part of what makes our country great, is a well structured safety net. And make no mistake-its self-serving. A desperate person will take desperate acts. Put a program in place to keep a few people from being mugged for their money.
So we balance-do we know that there is a lot of fraud and bullshit in the welfare system? Yes. But what are the options? Spend more money in the system to root out those that are being fraudulent, instead of actually funding the system? Make people jump through hoops to get help that makes said help harder to obtain?
I kind of like the solution we have: do what we can with what we've got. We catch the big ones, accept some of the small ones and make life on welfare not something to emulate or enjoy.
And I'm a huge fan of changing the system and eliminating huge bureaucracies. Great! But THAT costs money. And when you eliminate huge swaths of government, you eliminate oversight.
As far as I'm concerned..keep administrative budgets tight and make sure that the unions don't make too good a case that at $50/hr they are underpaid and the problem will solve itself. You can't bloat anything if there is no excess money just sitting around waiting to get soaked up.
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listened to a bit of it here and there can't stand christy cutting people off and how she just ignored facts
caught the ending thought it was hilarious that Christy tried to take a jab at the NDP over photo-radar given the kerfuffle over her red light running
thought it was hilarious when it was Dix's turn immediately after that remark and he noted that he wouldn't bring back photo radar but supported the red light cams
I don't think Dix responded as powerfully/well as I expected him to but I liked how he didn't ignore the other party reps, even posing questions to them
but i didn't listen too much so im not sure how they all really did
Overall it was "meh" which is what I expected. I am always hoping for more, but in reality it was the same stuff all the candidates have been talking about for the last few weeks.
There were a couple good jabs and things that made us laugh out loud but, unfortunately, nobody capitalized on each others' bullshit which was annoying.
Green= out to lunch. no real platform....brought a couple okay points up about the pipeline and Clark's stance on it however, there was no new developments with Clark's 5 point thing she kept reverting to. Talked a lot about wind energy and how BC Hydro is shutting down all these proposed developments that will stick a dent in hydro's profits. Referred to some Thunder Mountain development that I don't know anything about so I can't really add much on the relevance of this proposal that was shut down. Other than that it was like watching your crazy aunt ramble about her cat collection for 90 mins.
Conservatives= took some good jabs at Clark but is appears that he wants to win at all costs. He talked non-stop about the carbon tax and how he will eliminate it however, he did not go into how his gov't would work to pay off the deficit. He just kept repeating that they are fiscally conservative....fiscally conservative....fiscally conservative but failed to go any further. Basically he was just repeating three things: Clark sucks, fiscally conservative, and he will eliminate the carbon tax. His 4 fired candidates were brought up and he addressed it pretty damn good. Basically said they done wrong and he doesn't have the patience to deal with bullshit....then called Clark out on keep one of her dudes who has been busted drinking and driving. I respect that he doesn't have time to deal with shit candidates and made the quick decision and I'd fail Clark on not really addressing the faults within her party.
Libs= Nothing new. When pushed about the pipelines she just repeated the 5 conditions she wanted and then when asked if she would "sell BC for the right dollar amount" basically said "yes". Talked NON-STOP about families...families first....families living here....families working....families having dinner...blah blah blah. The red light situation was brought up on the second question and she hugely back peddled on her aloofness yesterday and addressed it as you expect any politician to but then switched gears half-way through to talk about families first so it was a little disingenuous. On every question is was pivot pivot pivot pivot....basically political bullshit. These Punjabi, Cantonese, and Mandarin Clark is running are pretty fucking slimy and that was talked about. Overall, I think this $1200 child fund\RRESP thing is total bullshit and the way she is going about using it as a political challenge to Dix is dick move. Her "balanced" budget was called out several times and she denied that its bullshit which was annoying because it clearly is.
NDP= not the best speaker and was pretty shaky when he started off. didn't have a lot more to say that what his platform is...which was released last week so it was kind of old news. consistently pointed out how the NDP were not running attack ads and whenever Clark took a jab at him he would revert back to this. He was pushed a bit on how he would pay for his spending: raise taxes for those over $150k and apply the carbon tax to the natural gas industry (who are currently exempt). Yes, he is spending a lot of money and fully admits he will be running a deficit with no plans to get out. Pretty much what you expect from the NDP. This $1200 child thing is a hot debate between him and Clark (which I pointed out above) but other than that, there was not a lot of argument between the two that was note-worthy. Oh, he was the only candidate that is in favor of decriminalizing marijuana....or at least, he is the only one who gave a straight answer.
Overall, the mood was Dix will win and Clark is pushing to be the opposition. They seem pretty set with that, but Cummings is not giving in at all....dude wants your votes and short of offering money he seems like he would do anything to get it. Sterk knows she has no chance to the point where her party isn't even investing time or money in developing a platform. She basically said, "I dunno...we need to look at the books after we win and ask BC how they want us to send money". It was pretty sad.
So yeah....I've rambled enough. Didn't sway my vote at all, but was alright to watch.
There are more doctors coming to Metro Vancouver and unemployed than those leaving. A good chunk of cardiologists, orthopedic surgeons living locally are hardly employed and living off their spouses wages (often doctors, and they rely on tax lawyers to optimize their taxes). The hire rate is 1 a year locally, a good 10 come to the city every year (in about a few month's time when they get their fellowship)
The problems are:
1. We have a fixed budget.
2. We cannot afford to hire more nurses to staff the OR (we keep hiring PN from Philippines to keep the number up but they can only work at the wards). So specialists that rely on OR are out of work.
3. Doctors are not retiring at the rate they are churning them out.
4. We need another center for Children / peds outside of Lower Mainland.
Guess what? it is mostly Feddies responsibility, this is a provincial election.
OR Nurses are in huge demand and they can moonlight at private clinics on their day offs.
You want more help and compassion? Be dedicated: Move to Kitimat or anywhere along Highway 15 / middle of no where live for a decade or so, volunteer like mad and then apply. I think at PG they made you sign some kind of agreement to stay in the area, then they accept you as a med student for rural med. The feds also forgive any student loans after x number of years if you stay. Most people can't hack it, that's why no one is there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Anjew
we need serious health care reforms.
more funding
implement strategies to keep our doctors in the province (most of the UBC grads will not work in BC).
more subsidy to help some of us who are capable and passionate but lack the monetary means to do so.
A good chunk of cardiologists, orthopedic surgeons living locally are hardly employed and living off their spouses wages (often doctors, and they rely on tax lawyers to optimize their taxes). The hire rate is 1 a year locally, a good 10 come to the city every year (in about a few month's time when they get their fellowship)
The problem is that everyone wants to be a specialist. No one wants to be a GP anymore. There is a HUGE need for GP's, over here on the island you have to consider yourself lucky if you manage to get one. I've been here 6 years already, and I still don't have one.
Actually to be a GP, you still need to have specialist training (2 years). You can't graduate from med school and practise anymore. Don't forget if you are outside metro areas, the doctors need rural training which is on top of or in conjunction with GP specialty (McMaster).
When it comes to GP, a lot of them work 1/2 time because the other half they do private care... like dermatology because they can charge private rate. You know who are the real gatekeepers to GP? Their office staff, if you really desperate to find a GP, get to know the office staff at their usual hangouts like Starbucks etc. It sucks but that's how it is.
Besides being a specialist you save a huge chunk of office overhead, your training is paid for, free conferences etc etc.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Great68
The problem is that everyone wants to be a specialist. No one wants to be a GP anymore. There is a HUGE need for GP's, over here on the island you have to consider yourself lucky if you manage to get one. I've been here 6 years already, and I still don't have one.
The problem is that everyone wants to be a specialist. No one wants to be a GP anymore. There is a HUGE need for GP's, over here on the island you have to consider yourself lucky if you manage to get one. I've been here 6 years already, and I still don't have one.
I would like to see a continued expansion of support for nurse practitioners in British Columbia to combat the GP shortage; as a province, we're far behind Alberta and Ontario in this effort.
I thought most of the nurse practitioners in BC became normal nurses or health management since we didn't have money to hire them at 80k/head? NDP was hopping mad about it with the money we had spent training them but can't hire them within union wage structure, I wonder how they will change that with the same amount of money.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MindBomber
I would like to see a continued expansion of support for nurse practitioners in British Columbia to combat the GP shortage; as a province, we're far behind Alberta and Ontario in this effort.
I thought most of the nurse practitioners in BC became normal nurses or health management since we didn't have money to hire them at 80k/head? NDP was hopping mad about it, I wonder how they will change that with the same amount of money.
Several problems with NPs:
One: Unions. Are they doctors? Nurses? What the fuck, man?
Two: Doctors. Are they doctors? Are they not? What the fuck, man?
Three: Ministries. They're not doctors! What the fuck, man!
Four: People. They're not doctors! What the fuck, man!
The only ones I know that are doing NP work work for the DTES mental health team (going from rooming houses to rooming houses).. Use your worst imagination to imagine how their days go and multiple that by at least 2x.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Graeme S
Several problems with NPs:
One: Unions. Are they doctors? Nurses? What the fuck, man?
Two: Doctors. Are they doctors? Are they not? What the fuck, man?
Three: Ministries. They're not doctors! What the fuck, man!
Four: People. They're not doctors! What the fuck, man!
I thought most of the nurse practitioner in BC became normal nurses since we didn't have money to hire them at 80k/head?
The Government has offered limited support to NPs because Physicians lobby against their introduction to the health care system, arguing they're not capable of providing adequate quality basic care and would therefore place patients at risk. NPs earn 100k/head, I believe; the important point here being that they earn a lot less than a GP to do the same job.
Well NP do lack liability insurance as a normal GP pays 60k up to 100k for a surgeon a year for malpractice insurance.
In the end, if we had got the NP to be OR nurses, we would have less of a backlog in surgeries.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MindBomber
The Government has offered limited support to NPs because Physicians lobby against their introduction to the health care system, arguing they're not capable of providing adequate quality basic care and would therefore place patients at risk. NPs earn 100k/head, I believe; the important point here being that they earn a lot less than a GP to do the same job.
That's like saying "If more GPs decided to spend the extra few years becoming specialists, we'd have less of a surgical backlog"
Becoming an NP is not the same as becoming an RN. There's a lot more time invested. "If we took X people and got them to do Y job" is a straw man. Every solution has its own problems.
The problem is the current bottleneck in BC is OR time caused by lack of OR support staff. Not just in Lower Mainland but pretty much BC. Trial, Kelowna etc have ORs that are not staffed and docs twiddling their thumbs. With all the thumbs twiddling, they have to either time out and give up their specialist licensing or leave for greener pastures like Ab or States and keep their specialist licenses. Each doc needs about 2 full OR days/ week to keep their licenses current.
If they loose their specialist licensing, they are not doctors anymore, that's the whole medical career. They can't default to GP eg.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Graeme S
That's like saying "If more GPs decided to spend the extra few years becoming specialists, we'd have less of a surgical backlog"
Becoming an NP is not the same as becoming an RN. There's a lot more time invested. "If we took X people and got them to do Y job" is a straw man. Every solution has its own problems.
Well NP do lack liability insurance as a normal GP pays 60k up to 100k for a surgeon a year for malpractice insurance.
In the end, if we had got the NP to be OR nurses, we would have less of a backlog in surgeries.
Interesting, I've wondered how NP liability works.
I'm sure a simple solution to OR nurses exists, it's a less complex issue than its treated as. A tangible wage premium (the current is $20/month?), priority entrance into nursing school in exchange for x years in a OR, etc.
That's one of reason why the NP idea didn't take off because the current physician insurance didn't want to take them because it is an unknown quantity.. Honestly no physicians lobbying needed, the support system is non existent to start. Insurance companies are not charities, they look at tangible data points etc. NP is unknown, and no way they would insure someone who are doing the same job as a GP and trained less for cheaper than what they charge a GP.
Not that many nurses want to spend extra years for the OR specialty.. add up the extra years you mind as well have gone to med school in the first place.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MindBomber
Interesting, I've wondered how NP liability works.
I'm sure a simple solution to OR nurses exists, it's a less complex issue than its treated as. A tangible wage premium (the current is $20/month?), priority entrance into nursing school in exchange for x years in a OR, etc.
Liberals bought the front page of 24hours and made the ad look like a news story. Claims that Clark won the debate when a poll inside the paper indicates that Dix won.
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LOL thats fucking so pathetic. Its like when you are 7 years old and get your hockey photos and there is a 7x10 that is a fake hockey magazine cover with you posing and a bunch of headlines about you scoring like 65 goals in a season.
AFAIK the OR nurses and even NP programs are post grad. I don't think there is need for priority entrance, as there are already a pool of qualified grads. The issue is most grads rather work and live life rather than go through another 2 years + practicum and schooling. If you offering priority it will be akin to offering priority entry to undergrad for medical school, even if you don't know the candidate will make it through first year undergrad. (IB grad to second year UCal Med program is the rare exception).
Besides, healthcare management similar post grad program is way cushier and less stressful not to mention you get to boss MDs around and get paid more than them to do it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by MindBomber
Interesting, I've wondered how NP liability works.
I'm sure a simple solution to OR nurses exists, it's a less complex issue than its treated as. A tangible wage premium (the current is $20/month?), priority entrance into nursing school in exchange for x years in a OR, etc.
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