Ready, willing and unable: Foreign-trained doctors struggle to find work in Manitoba

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This article was published 06/12/2014 (3974 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If it’s tough finding a doctor in this province, it’s even tougher for doctors originally from outside Canada to find work here.

A group of foreign-trained physicians is trying to change that.

“We have something to give — they just need to use us,” Elena Sakharov told about 60 international medical graduates who met for the first time this week.

The Manitoba International Medical Graduates Association started a few years ago as a loosely organized group of a handful of doctors. They formed study sessions, shared textbooks and information and offered each other encouragement, said Gulniyaz Abisheva, a general surgeon from Kazakhstan and one of the group’s founders.

But the association’s numbers grew exponentially Wednesday when word of a meeting got out through Success Skills Centre, a non-profit agency that helps foreign-trained professionals put their skills to work in Manitoba.

They thought maybe 20 physicians would show up. Nearly 60 packed the place.

“I was so excited,” said co-founder Abisheva. “It was full.”

They were family doctors and specialists from around the world who’ve been struggling on their own trying to qualify to practise medicine in Manitoba.

There are few opportunities — and many bureaucratic requirements to overcome — for foreign doctors to progress to the point where they’re licensed to practise medicine here or, at the very least, use their skills as clinical assistants.

Sakharov estimates there are close to 200 frustrated international medical graduates, although no one has precise figures. At the same time, Manitoba has long emergency-room waits in cities and patients in northern and rural areas without doctors.

“In such a great country, it’s a shame,” she said.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Manitoba says there were 2,682 doctors in the province as of September. That’s up by 83 over last year. However, only 627 practise outside of Winnipeg.

The province promised in 2011 that by 2015, any Manitoban who wanted a family doctor should have access to one, but, by some estimates, as many as 70,000 Manitobans currently lack a family physician.

As a result of Wednesday’s meeting, the group started putting together a database to find out how much medical expertise and experience is out there and whether it’s being put to use, said Sakharov.

In two days, the association received 50 responses from the doctors who attended. They’ve been living here anywhere from two to eight years. About half are working as health-care support workers, while the others have survival jobs such as kitchen staff and security guards. A few found work as research assistants. Many are losing hope.

After surviving the rigours of medical school, working as a doctor and settling into a new country and culture, they’re a resilient group, said Sakharov, but “they don’t see any opportunities.” The non-profit association wants to help them navigate the maze of bureaucracy they face to work as doctors again.

In the meantime, they want more opportunities to work as clinical assistants — which allows them to put their skills to work without the physician’s title, salary or independence.

Russell Ives, the new program director of the physician assistant/clinical assistant program, told the group the opportunities are out there.

“The predictions are the province is going to need 200 physicians assistants and clinical assistants over the next three to five years,” Ives said. “I think there are jobs for some of you if you meet the requirements.

“If you don’t get picked for the first one, apply for others.”

The association is hoping the database will underscore the talent available to the province.

Many foreign-trained doctors arrive feeling isolated, lost and in competition for a few rare openings in the International Medical Graduates program, Sakharov said.

She knows the barriers and challenges to practice. The Ukrainian became a family doctor in Siberia and practised there and in Jerusalem before coming to Winnipeg in 2006.

She told the assembled doctors the goal of the association is to help each other, answer questions and try to work as a group with the health authorities and medical establishment.

“How do we make easier our way through the system?” she said.

“As an association, we want to have a good relationship with the health authorities.”

She said Manitoba is the only province without an association of international medical graduates. The province also has a reputation for being one of the toughest places for them to have their credentials recognized and return to practise. And it allows foreign-trained doctors living elsewhere in Canada to apply to the Manitoba International Medical Graduates program even though those who complete it may not stay in the province.

Kristina Gavlova, a Russian-trained doctor and mother of six, didn’t speak a word of English when she came to Canada eight years ago. Her husband got a job on a farm near Brunkild and she taught herself English before they moved to Winnipeg 18 months later.

After years of hard work and study, she passed the exam to become a clinical assistant and is now working in forensic psychiatry as a clinical assistant at Health Sciences Centre. She often cares for patients waiting for a court-ordered psychiatric assessment.

She can admit the patient, take an assessment, order medication, lab work and consultations. She became the first clinical assistant in the department about 18 months ago to help with a shortage of doctors in that unit.

Although Gavlova is no longer called a doctor, she’s getting the Canadian experience she needs while doing the work she loves.

“I enjoy it,” said Gavlova, whose kids range in age from three to 16.

She’s not giving up on becoming a doctor though. “After eight years of doing exams, I’m not going to stop.”

Abisheva was a general surgeon for 11 years in Kazakhstan until her husband got a job in Winnipeg in 2008. She spoke no English.

Today she’s working as a clinical assistant helping critically ill Manitobans. Meeting Sakharov and forming the association helped.

But the struggle to do the work she loves was a long, hard, expensive slog.

Abisheva knows of international medical graduates having to choose between a $200 textbook and feeding their family. Graduates who get one of the coveted spots in the Medical Licensure Program for International Medical Graduates will attend classes during the day and work as security guards at night to study and make ends meet.

Abisheva studied English and practised her language skills volunteering in a hospital. Some of her best language coaches were seniors in the geriatric program waiting to transition into personal care homes.

“Some were bored — they had no family. I spent time with them — they told me their story. I told them about myself,” said Abisheva, who has a six-year-old daughter.

Then she had an opportunity to job shadow a doctor working with post-traumatic brain injury patients. “I could see how she talked to a patient.” She learned about the process and charts, the medical documentation and how the system here works, she said.

In 2011, she took the clinical assistant’s exam and applied for jobs before being hired in 2012 at HSC as a clinical assistant.

Most of the patients she works with are critically ill.

Her department is where cancer patients receive chemotherapy and bone-marrow transplants.

She said the staff is supportive and happy to have the help. The former surgeon said she’s grateful for the opportunity to put her skills and passion to work.

“We just ask, please use us!”

The international medical grads are willing to go anywhere in the province, said Sakharov.

“Imagine the great benefit for Manitoba to get us working,” said Gavlova.

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca