N.B. primary care provider waitlist grows by 40,000 year-to-year

The New Brunswick doctor waitlist has grown by 40,000.

Premier Susan Holt admitted she had some “salty language” when she learned the number of New Brunswickers waiting for a primary care practitioner actually increased over the last year.

The waitlist to be “attached” to a primary care provider or collaborative care clinic now sits at about 238,000 people, Holt revealed during her State of the Province address last Thursday.

That’s 40,000 more than this time last year, despite the Holt government opening or expanding 11 collaborative care clinics in 2025.

New Brunswick Health Minister John Dornan said he’s counting on better results when the data is calculated next year.

“Every clinic that we announced last year, none of them signed on 6,000 patients the next day. In fact, many waited until the contract was signed. And now the chickens are coming home to roost,” he said. “We’re seeing more people come on every single day. By next year, we’ll see the results of efforts that we made over this past year.”

But it’s a difficult wait for those without a family doctor or nurse practitioner.

“I’ve been waiting for one in the digital line for three years now,” said one Fredericton resident, who said she’s had to depend on the emergency department at the Dr. Everett Chalmers Regional Hospital, where she has waited as long as 10 hours to be seen.

“The issues I was dealing with, they were manageable, but I cannot imagine how difficult it is for people who need the assistance more than I do.”

Other residents who have a primary care provider said they know multiple people without one.

“Sometimes they’ll complain about what they have to do to try to see somebody,” another resident said.

Opposition leader Glen Savoie said it’s concerning just how many people have been added to the list.

“For all of the promises that they were going to change health care, it’s actually getting worse,” he said.

Holt said she’s aiming to open or expand another 11 or 12 clinics this year.

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