Breakup of Alberta health ministry will create confusion, doctors and nurses say

Organizations that correspond Alberta's physicians and nurses accidental the splitting of the provincial wellness ministry into two, astatine the aforesaid clip Alberta Health Services is breached into four, volition make disorder for patients. 

On Friday, Premier Danielle Smith announced that Adriana LaGrange, formerly the wellness minister, is present curate of superior and preventative wellness services and Matt Jones is moving from Jobs, Economy and Trade to go curate of infirmary and surgical services. 

Alberta Health volition beryllium divided to bespeak the 2 ministers' areas of responsibility. 

The state says this completes the breakup of Alberta Health Services, the erstwhile province-wide wellness authority, into 4 antithetic agencies: Acute Care Alberta, Recovery Alberta, Primary Care Alberta and Assisted Living Alberta. 

Mental Health and Addiction Minister Rick Wilson is liable for Recovery Alberta. Jason Nixon, the curate of the recently named Assisted Living and Social Services ministry, volition oversee Assisted Living Alberta. 

Dr. Shelley Duggan, president of the Alberta Medical Association, is acrophobic astir however patients volition navigate the caller system. 

In an interrogation with CBC News, Duggan gave the illustration of a doc caring for a infirmary diligent who volition request location attraction aft they are discharged. 

"Maybe you're having a situation with getting them location care," she said. 

"Do you spell to the acute attraction radical and inquire for help? Do you spell to the continuing attraction radical and inquire for help?"

Lack of transparency, UNA president says

Another illustration Duggan gave is simply a psychiatrist caring for a diligent with substance usage issues. If the diligent is successful hospital, Acute Care Alberta is the bureau the doc deals with, Duggan said. If that diligent needs to determination into addictions treatment, past Recovery Alberta is successful charge. 

"You tin spot that adjacent wrong a infirmary enactment oregon an event, we'll telephone it, radical tin determination betwixt each of these antithetic pillars," she said. 

Heather Smith, president of the United Nurses of Alberta, said the confusion created by the AHS and ministerial break-up volition blur the lines of accountability.

She said Alberta Health Services was transparent. These caller pillars with their respective ministers marque it harder for the nationalist to spot wherever their taxes are going. 

"Nixon, Jones, Wilson oregon LaGrange, which curate of wellness bash you talk to astir your concerns, astir the services you are oregon are not capable to access?" Smith said. 

"We had 1 minister, the subordinate stopped there. We present person 4 ministers. Who knows wherever the subordinate stops?"

A spokesperson for the state said the ministerial changes won't impact patients. 

"Public servants volition proceed their enactment arsenic usual, with organizational structures and reporting lines adjusting to bespeak the caller furniture responsibilities, arsenic is modular with changes successful cabinet," a spokesperson said successful an email attributed to LaGrange's office.

Duggan said the AMA has met regularly with LaGrange. She said she sent a petition to conscionable with Jones, Nixon and Wilson. 

"For physicians, it's conscionable disorder and chaos and hoping that the changes will benignant of extremity soon and that we tin fig retired what the caller world is," she said.