Primary-care doctors’ improved pay model ‘a game-changer’

A new payment model for family doctors in Manitoba has proven effective at retaining and recruiting physicians to the province, with more than 100,000 new patients connected to ongoing care providers since it launched last spring.

Doctors Manitoba, the group representing physicians in the province, reviewed the Family Medicine Plus funding model, finding it contributed to a net gain of 184 family doctors practising in the province over a one-year period.

They include both new recruits and physicians who returned to working and accepting new patients in family medicine, said group president Dr. Nichelle Desilets.

“What I’m hearing from family doctors is that Family Medicine Plus is a game-changer,” she said.

“While family medicine and primary care is still felt to be undervalued, we are finally being paid for some of the unpaid work that we’ve been doing for years.”

The funding model, negotiated with the provincial government in April 2024, changed the way family doctors are compensated.

While physicians are still paid for each patient who visits them, they can also claim remuneration based on their overall patient load, and the complexity of those patients’ health conditions. Additionally, those doctors can now bill for a portion of the hours they spend providing indirect care, including monitoring and following up with patients.

“What I’m hearing from family doctors is that Family Medicine Plus is a game-changer.”

Manitoba is among only a handful of provinces offering such a funding model, following similar programs introduced by B.C. and Nova Scotia in 2023.

The change provides more stability for family doctors and allows them to invest more time treating, understanding and communicating with their patients, Desilets said.

“There’s real value in that,” she said. “Family medicine is a really challenging job because you have to know so much about so many areas of medicine, but the job becomes easier when you know your patients well.”

Dr. Sohail Gandhi, past president of the Ontario Medical Association and a family doctor in that province, said the new funding model — and the Manitoba New Democrats’ often-touted “listening” approach to health care — has piqued the interest of some family doctors elsewhere in Canada.

“You cannot have a high-functioning health-care system without happy, healthy and engaged physicians. That just does not happen,” Gandhi said.

“Let’s be realistic, no government is going to agree 100 per cent of the time with a doctors’ organization; that never happens. But, there seems to be a respectful conversation, some respectful listening, some collaboration.”

“You cannot have a high-functioning health-care system without happy, healthy and engaged physicians. That just does not happen.”

He referenced a medical conference he attended in September, in which many of his medical peers reported feeling burned out and were exploring ways to leave family medicine.

“Except for Manitoba. The few docs that I talked to from Manitoba, they were like, ‘No, things are going well, we’re happy, we’re not looking at retiring or giving up our practices and changing things.’”

According to data provided by Doctors Manitoba, the province boosted its ranks of family physicians from 654 to 838 between April 2024 and March 2025. There were more than 104,000 new patients attached to Manitoba physicians during that period.

The Canadian Institute for Health Information found Manitobans had the best access to primary health care in 2024, with 33 per cent of adults reporting being able to see their family doctor within one day of needing care.

That figure was the highest among all provinces, and better than the Canadian average of 27 per cent, the data shows.

The institute also analyzed Statistics Canada data collected in 2023 and 2024, finding 85 per cent of Manitoba adults have a family doctor — slightly higher than the national average of 83 per cent, and second to Ontario at 88 per cent.

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara celebrated the successful recruitment effort, but acknowledged more work is ahead.

Retaining physicians and recruiting more specialist doctors to work alongside family physicians is among the government’s priorities moving forward, Asagwara said.

“We make a lot of effort to go out and listen directly to doctors and health-care providers and we have seen that by working together, we can make improvements to health care,” Asagwara said. “It’s an approach that I’m really happy to hear physicians see as a valuable one.”

About 188,000 people were without a family doctor, pediatrician or primary care provider as of 2024, Doctors Manitoba said.

tyler.searle@freepress.mb.ca