Conflict in healthcare: "We can't afford to lose a single doctor."

The gap left by doctors leaving Quebec due to the conflict between the two federations representing them and the government will be very difficult to fill. And it is Quebecers who will pay the price, laments the owner of a private medical clinic network.

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"We cannot afford to lose a single doctor in Quebec," warns ^Dr. Marc Lacroix, in an interview with Isabelle Maréchal on QUB radio and television, broadcast simultaneously on 99.5 FM Montreal on Thursday.

^Dr. Lacroix, head of Lacroix Private Medicine, which currently offers the services of 125 doctors in 13 service points across Quebec, hopes that his network will be able to recover some of the professionals who intend to leave the province, since the effects of these departures could be felt for a very long time.

"This is a major crisis," he argues. "We haven't seen anything like this in Quebec for 20, 30 years, if not 40 years. And people are so fed up that I really think those who leave will be very difficult to convince to come back."

With the existing shortage of 2,000 doctors, the 200 to 300 who have left Quebec in recent days, and doctors over 65 years of age considering retirement, the situation could quickly turn into a catastrophe, he said.

Photo Stevens LeBlanc

"A 65-year-old doctor often has 2,000, 3,000, 4,000 patients under his care. When these doctors leave, they leave gaping craters of access problems," explains ^Dr. Lacroix.

See the full interview with Dr. ^Marc Lacroix in the audio and video clips above.