Activities

Year-end update

Continue to provide the PFSP service and monitor assistance levels to meet increasing need.

• PFSP has three core service areas: Assistance Line; Case Coordination; and Education, Prevention and Promotion.

Assistance Line – for the period of January 1, 2023 – July 31, 2023

• In this period, the PFSP received 2,168 calls to the Assistance Line which is an 18% increase over the same period in 2022. This increase is in line with the growth the program has been experiencing over the past four years. To address the impact of this growth on the PFSP, the service delivery model for the Assistance Line is currently moving towards two Assessment Physicians on first call each week.
• There were 6,092 therapy hours provided to eligible physicians and their families who called the Assistance Line. There were 2,066 hours of administrative time spent providing this counselling service by the third-party service provider, unify consulting group. For both therapy hours and administrative time there was a 13% increase over the same period in 2022.
• Assessment physicians provided 5,088 hours of coverage to the Assistance Line and spent 784 of these hours talking with individual callers, providing support and assistance.

Case Coordination - for the period of January 1, 2023 – July 31, 2023

• In this period, the PFSP’s Case Coordination service experienced an increase of 15% in new accesses over the same period in 2022. The number of physicians accessing this service on a yearly basis is
  typically small (approximately 30-35 in a year). Percentage fluctuations are expected and not necessarily indicative of trends or issues.
• There were 399 therapy hours provided to clients participating in Case Coordination and 61 hours of administrative time spent providing this counselling service by the third-party service provider, unify consulting group.

Education, Prevention, and Promotion – for the period of April – August 2023

• During this period 11 formalized activities were held that focused on prevention with some of those also providing an element of education and/or program promotion.
  • Of the 11 events, eight were targeted to Residents, three to students, and six to physicians.
  • Topics included Physician Suicide; Substance Use; Career Transitions; and Peer Support Team Training.
• The PFSP staff promoted the program and in particular the Assistance Line at five different events during this period that together encompassed physicians in all career stages and three locations (Edmonton, Calgary, and Red Deer).
• Staff worked with two physician authors to publish their work in Alberta Doctors' Digest.
• The PFSP continues to experience a surge in requests for family physicians through the Physicians 4 Physicians (P4P) service.
  • 360 requests for family physicians were received from January to July 2023, an 83% increase over this same time last year.
  • Of these requests, 335 (93%) were for providers in either Calgary or Edmonton while only 35 physician providers are located in the two urban centres.
  • June and July saw a record number of requests at 63 and 74 respectively.
• In an effort to bolster the service and meet the demand, the PFSP has reached out to collaborate with leaders from both Alberta Health Services and Primary Care Networks (PCNs). However, the reality of the family physician shortage has led to a mismatch between supply and demand. The sustainability of the service is uncertain.

Operationalize funding from the Affinity Collaboration (BNS, the CMA and MD Financial Management Inc.) to respond to and address the health and wellness needs of physicians and medical learners.

• Implement psychiatry services as an additional offering.

• Service provision to those physicians who fall outside of the eligibility criteria listed in the Grant Agreement is in place and ensures that retired physicians and those who may have been too ill to work in the past 12 months are able to receive support. From January to June 2023, 130 hours of therapy and administration time were provided to this group of physicians.
• A psychiatrist has been hired to support the Psychiatric Assessment program and began working with the PFSP clinical team in June. The psychiatrist is now working with clients and supporting the PFSP team to further develop the program.

Support Well Doc Alberta’s efforts to renew funding and scale and spread the program nationally through affinity funding made available through the CMA/BNS agreement.

• Well Doc Alberta’s initial three-year funding was secured with active support and assistance from the AMA. The AMA remains open to opportunities to help support activities related to securing funding, should they arise.

Priority Activities

Year-end update

Continue the Shine A Light initiative, highlighting both daily and extraordinary contributions of physicians that keep the system in motion. Use storytelling to facilitate and link to engagement in the AMA.

• Profile grassroots physicians with Shine A Light profiles in each issue of Alberta Doctors’ Digest.
• Profile and engage medical students:
  • Reactivate medical Student Spotlight series of student profiles in Alberta Doctors’ Digest.
  • Engage with medical student leaders and produce a video for students at large to explain how their input feeds into AMA governance.
  • Seek to return to pre-pandemic levels of participation in the RF by our contingent of student observers and enhance that experience through the RF Buddy mentoring program.
• Profile and engage resident physicians:
  • Collaborate with PARA to highlight the contributions of resident physicians
• Profile and engage physician leaders following each RF who have brought forward motions that flow into AMA advocacy. Tell their story and experience of engaging in the AMA.
• Highlight students and physicians receiving AMA scholarships, bursaries, grants and awards.

• The Shine A Light program has been revitalized and we are working to profile more physicians more frequently.
• We continue to highlight the everyday accomplishments of physicians showing up to do their job in such challenging times.
• The Joint Physician Advocacy Committee has launched a gratitude initiative to encourage and uplift the profession that will further support Shine A Light.
• Medical Student Spotlight has been reactivated but we hope to do more in this area next year.
• We celebrate our award winners, scholarships, in summer and fall of 2023.

Through the AMA Youth Run Club in schools across the province, equip teachers with tools and resources to engage children and youth in physical activity that are optimized for the post COVID learning environment.

• Youth Run Club is back in full swing as a face-to-face offering for the 2023-24 school year with inclusive program involving girl run clubs, kids with accessibility needs.
• We are pleased to be increasing the number of Indigenous communities with which we interact.
• Gold Sponsor Alberta Blue Cross and Silver Sponsor MD Financial Management make programming possible with their generous support.

Priority Activities

Year-end update

Advance the AMA’s Healthy Working Environments framework in the areas of Equity Diversity and inclusion, psycho-social wellness and safety and leadership, aligning activities with other system partners including AHS and the CPSA:

• In collaboration with AHS and the CPSA support implementation of the anti-racism online education project.
• Complete an environmental scan outlining the current supports available to Alberta physicians for navigating conflict. Gaps will be identified for further discussion by the AMA’s Healthy Working Environments Advisory Committee.
• Explore with Joule the offering of trauma-informed leadership and crucial conversation courses as part the coaching component of our CMA-funded Physician Leadership Professional Development program.
• Advance just culture and healthy working environments language in AMHSP contract discussions.
• Liaise with CMA for Alberta-specific findings from the recent physician wellness survey and integrate these findings into AMA advocacy.
• Further align work of the HWEAC and the Indigenous Health Committee.
• Advance discussions with AHS related to safe reporting and trauma-informed leadership.

• The AMA, the College of Physicians & Surgeons of Alberta and Alberta Health Services collaborated on a new online training course for Alberta’s physicians on race-based micro-aggressions. The course launched on June 14 and is available to all regulated members through the myCPSA virtual learning platform. Early results from post-training survey respondents are excellent and indicate that the VITALS tool and scenario-based learning are very useful. CME accreditation is expected in October 2023.
• Results of the environmental scan were discussed with the HWEAC. There was discussion on how to share this information with membership.
• PLI courses on Crucial Conversations and Trauma-Informed Leadership were offered in the Spring 2023. Approximately 39 physicians have met the criteria to participate in group coaching, which will be scheduled at a future date.
• The CMA National Physician Health Survey 2021 was released in August 2022 and states, “The key findings from the national study reveal that numerous subgroups are experiencing more negative wellness outcomes, including medical residents; those under 35 years of age; those identifying as women; those practicing six to 10 years; caregivers of a child and/or parent or family member in the home; those living with disabilities; and those working in small town/rural or isolated/remote areas. Still, not all the results are discouraging; there are signs of a culture shift toward prioritizing wellness. That is, medical residents and younger physicians report accessing support for their mental health challenges more frequently than practicing physicians who are at a later career stage. While some of those who need wellness supports are accessing them, there are still significant barriers to overcome, such as stigma, availability and concerns around confidentiality.” Alberta-specific findings, from this CMA survey, were released in January 2023. In general, “Respondents from AB are significantly less likely to have been experiencing burnout at the time of the survey (49% vs. 53% national total). Across other key psychological measures, there are no significant differences: half test positively for depression, and a quarter experience moderate to severe anxiety levels; 38% report having had thoughts of suicide at some point in their life and 14% have had thoughts in the past 12 months.” PFSP continues to advocate and collaborate on these important issues.
• Both the Indigenous Health Committee and HWEAC have been working towards identifying their respective committee priorities.
• AHS updated the AMA Healthy Working Environments committee on safe reporting, trauma-informed leadership training and other related initiatives at their spring meeting. AHS established a Bilateral Complaint Resolution group in October 2021. Its purpose is to focus on improving processes for worker-to-worker concerns, including harassment and violence complaints. The work is ongoing with an anticipated end date of June 30, 2025.

Support individual physicians and groups in conflict situations that exist within practices and with AHS.

• PFSP collects statistics regarding the number of calls related to workplace or occupational concerns.
• The AMA receives periodic updates on the Edmonton Zone Medical Staff Association’s pilot program which funds a 0.3 FTE Physician Advisor to support physicians in conflict. Early data on program uptake has been presented to the Board.