The Ontario Physician Recruitment Alliance (OPRA) is at the forefront of addressing the physician recruitment crisis in Ontario. With a significant percentage of the population not enrolled with a primary care physician (Ministry of Health PEM data, Oct 2024) and 2.52 million “uncertainly attached” to a primary care provider (INSPIRE ), the gap between the care needed and the care available to Ontario residents is vast.
When you factor in how quickly Ontario’s population is growing, it is obvious that attention to this shortage of primary care access is urgent, and that the work of the team of recruitment professionals within OPRA’s network is vital to the health of the people of this province.
The Ontario Physician Recruitment Alliance was established by a team of community recruiters to provide centralized support and funding for local recruitment programs province wide. Within this larger Alliance are five geographic regional groups that work together on shared physician recruitment goals and community engagement.
The members of OPRA have a focus on international recruitment, standardization of financial incentives, immigration processes, system education, accessing provincial and federal grants, and advocating for the removal of barriers faced by recruiters and incoming physicians. This team is committed to transforming how doctors are recruited, onboarded, retained, and supported.
With the goal of increasing physician numbers in mind, the outcome of putting more family doctors in place is the streamlining of services, the reduction of the strain on emergency departments, and improvements in individual care. When the number of family doctors does not meet the demand, OPRA team members are also pivotal in finding solutions for the community shortages in primary care.
By engaging local and internationally trained physicians, medical students, and family medicine residents, OPRA members are expanding efforts to meet the urgent healthcare needs of Ontario’s people.
It is important to note that as this is a community-based alliance, only those regions with recruiters in place are part of the team. There are several Ontario towns, counties, and cities that do not have a community family doctor recruitment lead in place.
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