Health ministry says it’s working hard to keep health care workers
By Sam Leishman - Lethbridge Herald Local Journalism Initiative Reporter on March 28, 2025.
Alberta’s Health Ministry is arguing that plenty of progress is being made to retain health care workers and improve surgical capacity.
The Herald received written comments from the Minister of Health’s office on Thursday following a story published the same day regarding a new report from Friends of Medicare.
As previously reported, Access Denied: How the Changing Accessibility of Health Care Services in Alberta Impacts Equity takes a closer look at how dwindling capacity and access is resulting in health care needs going unmet throughout the province.
Chris Gallaway, executive director of Friends of Medicare, explained to the Herald that a lack of investment into public health care is leaving more and more people without a family doctor, which is ultimately causing longer wait times for emergency care, surgeries, cancer treatment and much more at hospitals.
His organization asserts that the province must make a plan to stabilize the workforce, respect the opinions and hard work of nurses and doctors to prevent them from leaving the public system or moving to other jurisdictions, put more dollars into public healthcare to keep up with inflation and population growth and focus less on building for-profit, private surgical centres.
However, the office of Alberta Minister of Health Adriana LaGrange says it is looking at the situation from a different perspective.
It points out that the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta (CPSA) reported a four-percent increase in the number of physicians at the end of 2024 compared to 2023, resulting in the highest number of doctors in the province’s history at 12,212.
The Minister’s office says there have been significant gains reported in the nursing workforce since 2020, as well. Registered nurses have increased by 27.5-percent, licenced practical nurses by 15.4-percent and registered psychiatric nurses by nearly 10-percent.
“Clear evidence that more health care professionals are choosing to work in this province,” it states.
The Minister’s office also points to a couple of new initiatives aimed at recruiting more health care workers. Those include a new physician compensation model launching within the coming days that will take a step back from the traditional fee-for-service approach, as well as enhancements to the International Medical Graduate Program that will streamline residencies, increase the number of available spots and lend more support to Albertans studying medicine outside of the country.
In regard to surgical capacity, LaGrange’s office maintains that chartered surgical facilities (CSF) play a key role in reducing wait times. The government’s goal for this year is to complete 310,000 surgeries, nearly 60,000 of which will take place at CSFs. That target will increase to more than 316,000 surgeries next year, including 65,000 at CSFs.
“These partnerships have helped increase access to publicly funded procedures at both hospitals and CSFs, including over 6,000 orthopedic surgeries annually in Edmonton and Calgary alone, with further expansions planned for other regions.”
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The only focal point for this government involves privatizing health care in this province.