'Underserved' Stoney Point, Ont., rallying for a nurse practitioner

It's been several years since the last doctor practising in the Lakeshore, Ont., community of Stoney Point retired.

Since then, resident Brian Antaya has had to travel to 45 minutes to Amherstburg, Ont., for regular checkups for his Type 2 diabetes. 

Antaya, like many others in the small community, is cheering on efforts to get a nurse practitioner working at a local pharmacy that doubles as a walk-in clinic. 

"When you're taking medication and you want to keep up on all the visits, and a lot of times you just don't do the visits because, well, in my case [my doctor's] in Amherstburg now," Antaya said. 

"We need it. We need it in this community. It's just a matter of importance."

The province recently started accepting proposals to expand primary-care teams, and it's an opportunity the Lakeshore Nurse-Practitioner Led Clinic (NPLC) and Healthpoint Pharmacy are hoping to seize. 

The Lakeshore NPLC has three nurse practitioners on site in Belle River, but the clinic is caring for 2,400 patients and is full.

The clinic is applying for four more nurse practitioners, one that would be slated to work onsite at Healthpoint in Stoney Point at Seifin's request, while the other three would join the Lakeshore NPLC. 

Healthpoint Pharmacy currently offers a walk-in Telehealth clinic.

Pharmacist Mina Seifin said residents need a health-care provider onsite full time. 

"I am feeling hopeful because I am [finding] a lot of support and a lot of need. We are a place we can say, 'It's ready to go,'" Seifin said. He said once a nurse is secured, he or she can start work "tomorrow."

Seifin said about 50 per cent of the population of Stoney Point, Lighthouse Cove and other nearby communities are aged 60 or older. 

If they can find a family doctor, they're facing at least a 15-minute drive. That can be tough in the winter when snow and darkness complicate the commute. 

With the Telehealth clinic, internationally trained providers are onsite, supervised by an off-site doctor. But once the doctors are licensed in Canada, they leave for larger communities, Seifin said.

The Telehealth clinic is convenient, but Seifin said he reached out to the Lakeshore Nurse-Practitioner Led Clinic to try to get a provider on-site. 

"You're looking at the long term effect of an unattached person to health care and what that impact is on the system itself," said Kate Bolohan, lead nurse practitioner at the Lakeshore NPLC. "People that have health-care providers fare better. There's fewer emerg visits. There's fewer hospital admissions.

"You invest now in communities over the long run, you're going to save with hospital admissions and emerg visits."

Lakeshore Mayor Tracey Bailey said the community has been "undeserved."  

"We've had a significant need in this part of Lakeshore for quite some time," Bailey said. "This call from the government comes at the perfect timing. I think that we're nicely positioned with the facilities that are set up ready to go, nurse practitioner-led clinic in the heart of Lakeshore already."

Bolohan said she's optimistic for the clinic's chances of a successful application. She said they hope to have an outcome this fall. 

But in the meantime, the community has rallied in support of a petition showing the need for a nurse practitioner in the community.

Since it started in mid-May, it has gathered more than 600 signatures. 

"We can write that, you know, this community has been without a primary-care provider for [years]," Bolohan said. 

"But I think it means a whole lot more just to show the ministry, "Look at all of these patients who have come together to sign this petition to advocate for their community."