Welcome to the second year in review from Find a Doctor BC.
We have put together statistics about what happened in 2022 with regard to family practitioners accepting new patients in BC.
Areas covered.
By May 2022 we had the entire province covered after adding all of Northern BC early in the year. We now monitor about 3,700 family practitioners in 798 clinics located in 138 towns and cities.
Results
From our data throughout the province, at end of 2022, there were 43 clinics who were accepting new patients, 22 who were accepting new patients in a limited way, 48 had a wait list and 685 were not accepting new patients and had no wait list.
Typically, there is only one family practitioner at a time in a clinic accepting new patients. This implies about 1 in 55 family practitioners were accepting new patients at the end of year.
During 2022 we detected a total 218 family practitioners accepting new patients at some point during the year.
At the end of 2022,
• 46 towns/cities had at least one clinic accepting new patients
• 38 towns/cities had no clinics accepting at the end of the year but had at least one clinic accepting new patients at some point in 2022
• 54 towns/cities did not have a single clinic accepting new patients during 2022.
Following is a list of BC towns and cities that have had at least one clinic…
| Accepting new patients at the end of 2022 | Not accepting now, but were at some point in 2022 | Never accepting at anytime in 2022 |
| Abbotsford | Beaverdell | 100 Mile House |
| Agassiz | Cobble Hill | Aldergrove |
| Alert Bay | Comox | Armstrong |
| Bella Bella | Coquitlam | Ashcroft |
| Burnaby | Courtenay | Brentwood Bay |
| Burns Lake | Delta | Burnaby |
| Chetwynd | Enderby | Campbell River |
| Chilliwack | Grand Forks | Castlegar |
| Clearwater | Hazelton | Chase |
| Dawson Creek | Hope | Chemainus |
| Denman Island | Houston | Cranbrook |
| Duncan | Invermere | Crawford Bay |
| Fort Nelson | Kaslo | Creston |
| Fort St James | Logan Lake | Elkford |
| Fraser Lake | Maple Ridge | Fernie |
| Gitlax?t’aamiks | Mission | Fort McMurray |
| Gold River | New Westminster | Fruitvale |
| Hornby Island | Osoyoos | Gabriola |
| Hudson’s Hope | Parksville | Galiano |
| Kamloops | Pitt Meadows | Gibsons |
| Langley | Port Alberni | Greenwood |
| Lillooet | Port Coquitlam | Kelowna |
| Lumby | Port Moody | Keremeos |
| Mackenzie | Powell River | Kimberley |
| Masset | Prince George | Kitimat |
| North Vancouver | Qualicum Beach | Ladysmith |
| Pemberton | Revelstoke | Lake Country |
| Penticton | Richmond | Lake Cowichan |
| Port Alice | Salmon Arm | Lantzville |
| Port Hardy | Sechelt | Madeira Park |
| Port McNeill | Sooke | Mayne Island |
| Queen Charlotte | Squamish | Merritt |
| Quesnel | Vanderhoof | Mill Bay |
| Richmond | Vernon | Moberly Lake |
| Rossland | West Kelowna | Nakusp |
| Salmo | Williams Lake | Nanaimo |
| Stewart | Nelson | |
| Surrey | New Denver | |
| Tofino | Okanagan Falls | |
| Tumbler Ridge | Oliver | |
| Ucluelet | Pender Island | |
| Valemount | Penticton | |
| Vancouver | Prince Rupert | |
| Victoria | Princeton | |
| West Vancouver | Quathiaski Cove | |
| White Rock | Saanichton | |
| Salt Spring Island | ||
| Shawnigan Lake | ||
| Sidney | ||
| Smithers | ||
| Sparwood | ||
| Summerland | ||
| Sun Peaks | ||
| Terrace | ||
| Trail | ||
| Westbank |
Note we only find clinics that are officially accepting new patients. If a doctor accepts a new patient via family and friends, we generally don’t hear about it. Our surveys show that about 1 in 7 patients find doctors through family and friends.
Search your town/city for clinics accepting new patients Search NowWebsite Usage
Patients looking for care used the Findadoctorbc.ca website a lot last year, with over 340,000 unique users accessing 2.2 million pageviews over the year. Having concise clinic listings and up-to-date accepting status available has helped avoid millions of extra phone calls to clinics asking whether they are accepting new patients.
Notification Service
In addition to the website, we offer a notification service that will send you an email when a clinic in your region starts accepting new patients. From exit survey data (given to people who are leaving the service), of those who filled out the survey, 71% had found a family doctor or nurse practitioner. Of those, 87% found a medical doctor, 10% a nurse practitioner and 2% a team practice. We also asked how these people actually found doctors. 55% had found the practitioner through the notification service while 14% had found one through family and friends and 31% by other means.
You can be notified when clinics start accepting new patients in your area. Sign-up NowA Final Word
It appears the BC Government’s recent actions are improving the situation. We have been able to report more family practitioners accepting new patients during the first month of 2023 as compared to the average month of 2022 and exit surveys in January 2023 showed 83% of those leaving the service had found a doctor.
Regards
Don and Ruth