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Lineup outside clinic in St. Lazare on Monday (above). Dianna Harrison (far left) signs up new patients. (Gazette photo)

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• St. Lazare

Desperate for a family doctor, people line up outside clinic

Doctor moves practice to St. Lazare, plans to accept 500 new patients

The Gazette
Monday, February 6, 2012

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Lineup outside clinic in St. Lazare on Monday (above). Dianna Harrison (far left) signs up new patients. (Gazette photo)

This story has been updated.

Hundreds of people desperate for a family doctor lined up in the cold early Monday morning, hoping to become one of the chosen few – a general practitioner had moved to St. Lazare and he was accepting 500 new patients.

By early afternoon, Dr. Stephen Harrison’s 500 new-patient quota was filled.
“We reached our 500th new patient just after noon,” said Dianna Harrison, the doctor’s wife who works as his receptionist.

“And no, we weren’t surprised that there was a line-up. We knew there’s a need for general practitioners in the area.”

In fact, just over a decade ago the numbers for the Vaudreuil-Soulanges area – covering towns including St. Lazare, Hudson, Île Perrot, Rigaud and Vaudreuil-Dorion – were dismal with one GP for every 2,068 residents, compared with the provincial average of one GP for every 1,104 residents.

The latest available statistics are no better: in 2009, when the population was at 117,000, there was one GP for every 2,660 residents in Vaudreuil-Soulanges, compared with one GP for every 1,842 residents province-wide. In all of the Monteregie, the ratio in 2009 was one GP for every 1,918 residents.

In fact, said Dr. Jacques Ricard, director of medical affairs for the Agence de la Santé et Service Sociaux de la Monterégie, the Vaudreuil-Soulanges area is in the top three worst areas for available GPs.

The other two areas are the Haut St. Laurent, which covers the Ormstown/Huntingdon area, with one GP for every 2,789 residents and Sorel with one GP for every, 2,538 residents.
Ricard said, however, that the Vaudreuil-Soulanges area may soon be getting as many as five new general practitioners.

“We will have those final details in about a month,” he added.

For her part, Harrison said she knew of three area doctors leaving in the past year alone.

“The reasons they left were retirement, relocation or health issues,” she said, adding that she had received 3,000 phone calls last week from area residents asking to sign up with Dr. Harrison.

“The first person we signed up when we opened our doors at 9 a.m. (Monday) told me she’d been waiting outside since 4 a.m.,” said Harrison. “There were over 150 people out there when I arrived.”

She said the doctor decided to move his practice to the Ste. Angelique St. clinic when the family – the couple have two young children – decided to move to the area from Île Perrot.
Harrison’s 1,200 patients from Île Perrot are expected to come to his new office in St. Lazare, she added.

“Most of those patients have said they will follow us to St. Lazare,” she said.
In addition to accepting 500 new patients to his family medicine practice, the doctor will take another 300 from the CLSC waiting list.