Effective December 1, daily cap on services is removed
December 1, 2022
Dear Members,
In case you missed it, Alberta Health published a bulletin announcing that effective December 1 (today), the daily cap on the number of services a physician can fully bill for will be officially lifted. This will ensure physicians are fully compensated for all visit services provided in a day. Also, a reminder that the daily visit services cap policy change will be reviewed and its impacts assessed before determining the future policy beyond the current fiscal year (March 31, 2023).
The minister and I announced this change on November 21. Removal of the cap on daily services will not only improve access to care for Albertans, but it will also help to stabilize the financial state of physician practices and businesses.
Your thoughts and questions are always welcome. You can email me via president@albertadoctors.org. You can also comment on this letter on the AMA website.
Regards,
fred Rinaldi, MD, CCFP, FCFP, LLB, MBA, MPA(HSA), BCom
President, Alberta Medical Association
"Fate whispers to the warrior, 'You can not withstand the storm.' The warrior whispers back, 'I am the storm.'"
2 comments
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Boris Boyko
10:37 PM on December 01, 2022
Removal of daily caps: not a great win when this administration ripped up our contract and altered billing for Family Physicians. They changed the landscape of Family Practice with numbers of physicians closing their offices (including me) or changing focus. This “win” is a vote getting ploy by a insensitive government who has profited in record surpluses on the backs of physicians,nurses, allied health and has performed a smoke and mirrors diversion by blaming solely AHS for the problem. I am very disappointed that we accepted a 4 yr agreement that does not get us back to the level of the 2019 contract. So let us ‘rejoice” in this win….yeah right!!!!
Patricia Simpson
10:52 AM on December 02, 2022
Having been a physician for nearly 40 years, I fail to see how there is really any true benefit from removing a cap on billing for 50 patients a day. Patients already feel they are rushed thru brief appointments, told they can only discuss one problem (when did an elderly person or anyone with chronic disease only have one isolated problem??). Feeling pushed to see more patients increases physician and staff exhaustion, burnout and potentially poorer care per patient. This government needs to put its money into better fees for time provided for good care not just fast care and also recognition of what a FD provides versus the specialist. A FD is a true generalist who does have to look at multiple problems in a visit. Take a look at the agreement BC physicians just finalized. How many more physicians does Alberta want to lose to BC?