PHRA Media Release |

Parkland International Medical Graduate (IMG) Recruitment Update
At present, we have two IMGs who will have completed their one year of training on February 4, 2012. Dr. Wagdi Salib and Dr. Jaswinder Kanwal have begun the process of applying for their conditional registration with the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Manitoba. In order to commence practice, and as part of the conditional registration, Dr.’s Salib and Kanwal are required to be paired with a physician practice advisor. The PRHA is working with physician groups in Swan River and Grandview to ensure this requirement is met. Following that, both Dr. Salib (Swan River) and Dr. Kanwal (Grandview) will be available to begin practicing within our Region.

The PRHA recently attended another initial interview session of potential IMG candidates in December 2011. While we made offers to eight IMG physicians, only four of them chose to accept an offer from the PRHA, with the other four accepting offers in other RHA’s in Manitoba. These four IMGs are currently in their one month orientation and will begin the IMG training program in February 2012.

PRHA Committed to Physician Recruitment Strategies
The Parkland Regional Health Authority (PRHA) continues to work extensively on physician recruitment and retention. The PRHA, like many other RHA’s, faces ongoing challenges in the recruitment of qualified health care professionals. We acknowledge that there are going to be periods of variability in regards to physician services within our Region. This can be attributed to many different reasons such as physicians (and their families) deciding to relocate to other centres, reduce or adjust their hours of practice, or retire. When these situations occur, we often do not have the luxury of having months of notice on our side. Therefore, every physician vacancy situation is different and we need to continue to cooperatively and collectively work with individual communities in the physician recruitment process.

During the past year, the PRHA has been consistently meeting with municipal leaders through its recently-formed Regional Physician Recruitment Working Group. This group meets on a regular basis to discuss ongoing recruitment strategies. As the Working Group can attest, recruiting a doctor to rural communities requires a team effort where not only are the programs, services, and colleague support at hospitals and clinics all in play, but so too are the amenities a community or region offer for family life. In a majority of cases, the Region is not only recruiting a position for a physician, but also a job for a spouse in a community as well.

International Medical Graduates (IMGs)
One of the recruitment strategies has seen the PRHA being active participants in the Provincial Medical Licensure Program for International Medical Graduates (IMGs). The Medical Licensure Program for IMGs assists foreign-trained physicians to obtain medical licensure and be able to practice as primary care physicians in Manitoba.

Through the parameters of the program, we continue to identify and sponsor (through financial support) select IMGs in an effort to fill vacancies that arise on a cyclical basis within the Region. It is important to note that the program is designed to ensure that high quality candidates go through all of the necessary training and regulatory steps. In some cases, that can take up to 18 months from the time a potential IMG is identified, a written offer of employment is agreed upon (which requires a return of service agreement to the sponsoring RHA), and all of the satisfactory results of the assessment process are completed. Another key point is that there is intense competition for physician resources from other RHA’s in Manitoba. In essense, that means the PRHA may only be able to ‘sponsor’ a few candidates every year depending on the number, and quality, of candidates available and whether or not the candidate accept positions within the Parkland RHA or another RHA.