WESTLOCK — The town of Westlock hosted an Alberta Health Services (AHS) professional tour on Saturday, Jan. 18. The tour was part of a new initiative promoting the community to soon-to-be graduates in the health care industry.
The day-long tour aimed to encourage current physician and nursing students to consider starting their careers in Westlock upon graduation. This is part of a proactive strategy in partnership with AHS to ensure the town maintains its health care services, which is critical as the demand for rural health care professionals continues to rise.
In the morning, the group had a chance to tour the community— first stopping at Kerri’s Café for a coffee and the Spirit Centre for a game of pickleball. After hearing from some speakers and meeting council members, the students headed to Westlock Health Care Centre for an afternoon skills session, where they heard about the day-to-day realities of working in a rural setting.
Throughout the day, students were provided a first-hand look at the benefits that accompany rural clinical practice, such as greater autonomy in their practice, along with the opportunity to develop close relationships with patients.
“One of the neat, unique things about a small town like ours is that government is so nimble, and doctors are very community minded,” says Jon Kramer, mayor of the town of Westlock. “You've seen a lot of rolling closures throughout the province, and we haven't had that yet here because we've had a group of physicians who have just been working tons of overtime to keep it open.”
Technically, the responsibility of health care falls under the provincial level of government, not the municipality level. However, Kramer stresses that the town of Westlock wants to be proactive in their approach. Though he says Westlock currently is sitting in a good spot with more doctors than surrounding communities, he believes there’s more to be done.
“We want to keep our emerge open long term in a sustainable way, not in a way that’s going to burn out our existing doctors,” adds Kramer. “We need to see our number of physicians rise. Everybody's kind of pitching in on that part.”
Kramer says he hopes to scale the event even larger in the future.
