Alberta government cuts number of medical students

[bcb]

Nurses (especially those who work in hospitals) deserve every penny they make. Think about it. 90% of the people nurses deal with on a day to day basis are not at their finest hour. They're abusive and their families are demanding and unrealistic. Those that deal with the sick automatically become the target for every problem during the hospital visit.

As for having to work holidays, sure you get overtime, but money isn't always equal to sanity unless you're a certain janitor from St. Albert

Also Mikey, is there ever a time when your not stirring the pot?

[mikey_the_redneck]

Originally Posted by bcb

Nurses (especially those who work in hospitals) deserve every penny they make. Think about it. 90% of the people nurses deal with on a day to day basis are not at their finest hour. They're abusive and their families are demanding and unrealistic. Those that deal with the sick automatically become the target for every problem during the hospital visit.

As for having to work holidays, sure you get overtime, but money isn't always equal to sanity unless you're a certain janitor from St. Albert

Also Mikey, is there ever a time when your not stirring the pot?

Stirring the pot?
I just gave my honest opinion.....from my life experience..

...and I have a bunch of teachers in my family too........don't get me started on them!

[Shazam]

Reading the last issue of Moneysense, they describe a retiring couple that both worked for the federal government for thirty years, thus getting their full pension, which works out to $120K a year, indexed for inflation. That's about $3 million in PV. They're also retiring at 55.

DB pensions are gold-plated.

[VladtheImpaler]

Originally Posted by fotze

God I hope they have done the math correctly and there is enough in the kitty to pay for all the upcoming retiring government workers. That liability is frightening.

There isn't. Luckily, I'm old, but most of your pay-cheque will be going to pay for retired government employees. I would start building your self-sufficient compound now.

[Shazam]

I'll be stringing up politicians if it comes to that.

[SebC]

IMO, defined benefit pensions should be prohibited.

[Shazam]

Originally Posted by SebC

IMO, defined benefit pensions should be prohibited.

Never'll happen. Executives live for these things.

[return to the red]

Originally Posted by bcb

Nurses (especially those who work in hospitals) deserve every penny they make. Think about it. 90% of the people nurses deal with on a day to day basis are not at their finest hour. They're abusive and their families are demanding and unrealistic. Those that deal with the sick automatically become the target for every problem during the hospital visit.

As for having to work holidays, sure you get overtime, but money isn't always equal to sanity unless you're a certain janitor from St. Albert

Also Mikey, is there ever a time when your not stirring the pot?

My girlfriend is in nursing right now in her final year and I hear about the "cuts" all the time. The problem with the Health care system and nurses is
1) a hiring "freeze". Technically they don't call it a freeze but they have put in certain clauses that make it very difficult for new nurses to obtain jobs, specifically in order to apply for a nursing posting you have to be an employee of Alberta Health services. Graduates coming out of school aren't so it's the same old I can't get a job because I have no experience/I have no experience because I can't get a job thing.

2) Lately there has been a movement by Alberta Health Services to move more job duties generally reserved for BN's and RN's to be handled by LPN's. Bad for BN's and RN's because really why would you pay them double the amount of pay that you could an LPN, this is also a horrendous idea for patients as well as basically you are now putting job duties that a RN would spend 4 years going to school for in the hands of someone who spent 2 years training in a much easier program.

The worst mistake that Alberta Health Services ever made was hiring Duckette after he took the Australian Health Care system and ran it into the ground.

I should mention that my post wasn't aimed at you more generally weighing in on the nursing debate

[I wanna be like Miikka]

Originally Posted by Canada 02

median 3.6 means half the class is below that; that pretty sucky! This is medical school not the faux disciplines.

sitting on the admissions committee, based on stats alone, you know who will most likely succeed, who will be placed

A lot of people in the UofC med school have done research with the Dean, wouldn't surprise me if a good number of the guys below 3.6 are the ones who have that research.

I should add, it seems as though schools like UofA, Western, Queens, etc admit students with a much higher GPA and would benefit from having more seats available.

[VladtheImpaler]

Originally Posted by Shazam

Never'll happen. Executives live for these things.

No, executives don't really care - they have enough money. Public service unions - there is your answer.

[DrJ]

Originally Posted by I wanna be like Miikka

A lot of people in the UofC med school have done research with the Dean, wouldn't surprise me if a good number of the guys below 3.6 are the ones who have that research.

I should add, it seems as though schools like UofA, Western, Queens, etc admit students with a much higher GPA and would benefit from having more seats available.

I respectfully disagree. Seats available should not be determined by the "quality" of students attending the program or their pre-interview marks. Firstly, MCAT and GPA are just a few indicators of whether an individual would be a good physician or not and to base ones admittance on those factors alone would be disastrous (which is why they evaluate applicants holistically).

While the schools you listed traditionally have students that have higher GPA's to gain admittance, some of these schools could not accommodate larger classes and I don't see how they would benefit from opening more seats. Seats should be allocated based on the schools philosophies, strengths and resources available. For example, Queen's meds has nothing on U of C or U of A in terms of infrastructure and could never support a class of 130+ until a new school itself is built.

GPA, IMO, is an indicator of success but is just a very small piece to indicate success but is unfortunately one of the most weighted factors when determining admittance.

Personally, I don't see how we are going to address the lack of physicians by cutting seats for very qualified individuals unless we remodel the health care system and culture of health services as mentioned earlier in a great post in the thread.

[Azure]

Yeah, it sure will be interesting how we'll be paying for all those pretty pension plans down the road.

There sure as hell better be enough money already laid away to pay for them all. Else the government or whoever ran the program should be taken out back and shot in the ass.

[MJM]

Originally Posted by return to the red

My girlfriend is in nursing right now in her final year and I hear about the "cuts" all the time. The problem with the Health care system and nurses is
1) a hiring "freeze". Technically they don't call it a freeze but they have put in certain clauses that make it very difficult for new nurses to obtain jobs, specifically in order to apply for a nursing posting you have to be an employee of Alberta Health services. Graduates coming out of school aren't so it's the same old I can't get a job because I have no experience/I have no experience because I can't get a job thing.

2) Lately there has been a movement by Alberta Health Services to move more job duties generally reserved for BN's and RN's to be handled by LPN's. Bad for BN's and RN's because really why would you pay them double the amount of pay that you could an LPN, this is also a horrendous idea for patients as well as basically you are now putting job duties that a RN would spend 4 years going to school for in the hands of someone who spent 2 years training in a much easier program.

The worst mistake that Alberta Health Services ever made was hiring Duckette after he took the Australian Health Care system and ran it into the ground.

I should mention that my post wasn't aimed at you more generally weighing in on the nursing debate

The reason the province is moving away from RNs is that there is far too many of them. Simple as that. No need to pay an RN when in a lot of circumstances their expertise are not needed, and a simple LPN will do. Hard to feel bad for the current RN grads when they full-well the circumstances before going that route. The LPN push is nothing new.

[bcb]

Originally Posted by I wanna be like Miikka

A lot of people in the UofC med school have done research with the Dean, wouldn't surprise me if a good number of the guys below 3.6 are the ones who have that research.

I should add, it seems as though schools like UofA, Western, Queens, etc admit students with a much higher GPA and would benefit from having more seats available.

It's possible for a student with a GPA of less than 3.6 to still be a good doctor and have good bedside manner.

[Shazam]

Originally Posted by VladtheImpaler

No, executives don't really care - they have enough money. Public service unions - there is your answer.

DB pensions are still very popular with the exec crowd.

[Shazam]

Originally Posted by bcb

It's possible for a student with a GPA of less than 3.6 to still be a good doctor and have good bedside manner.

I want my doctor to be the biggest fataing nerd in school. That's also true of my mechanic and gardener.

[I wanna be like Miikka]

Originally Posted by DrJ

I respectfully disagree. Seats available should not be determined by the "quality" of students attending the program or their pre-interview marks. Firstly, MCAT and GPA are just a few indicators of whether an individual would be a good physician or not and to base ones admittance on those factors alone would be disastrous (which is why they evaluate applicants holistically).

While the schools you listed traditionally have students that have higher GPA's to gain admittance, some of these schools could not accommodate larger classes and I don't see how they would benefit from opening more seats. Seats should be allocated based on the schools philosophies, strengths and resources available. For example, Queen's meds has nothing on U of C or U of A in terms of infrastructure and could never support a class of 130+ until a new school itself is built.

GPA, IMO, is an indicator of success but is just a very small piece to indicate success but is unfortunately one of the most weighted factors when determining admittance.

Personally, I don't see how we are going to address the lack of physicians by cutting seats for very qualified individuals unless we remodel the health care system and culture of health services as mentioned earlier in a great post in the thread.

Yeah I agree with everything you said. I didn't mean to come across as only students with high GPAs are good doctors. I actually believe the same as you, GPA is just 1 indicator of a doctors quality. I was merely trying to point out that Canada does not have a lack of quality students. If the schools opened up spots I think we have many qualified students that would make excellent doctors (not all of them with high GPAs).

[cSpooge]

Originally Posted by Azure

Yeah, it sure will be interesting how we'll be paying for all those pretty pension plans down the road.

There sure as hell better be enough money already laid away to pay for them all. Else the government or whoever ran the program should be taken out back and shot in the ass.

you mean the pension plans that have a huge surplus that the government might be dipping in to again?

[Shazam]

Yes, the Federal Public Service Pension Plan has a huge, massive surplus. Those government money managers are smart.

[GGG]

My favourite solution to Doctor shortages would be to drastically increase the number of spots available for doctors but at the same time set the tuition to approach the cost of educating the doctor.

Instead of scholorships you provide forgiveable interest free loans for large protions of the tuition. If after 10 years the Doctor is still in the province/country the loans could partially be forgiven.

Really I think most post-secondary education should be funded in this manner. If you leave the country you should have to pay back the gov's contribution to your education.