Quebec health care system leads way in 'failure': researcher

Université de Montréal researcher Damien Contandriopoulos said in an interview after the two-day conference opened on the future of hospitals for the Hospital Conference at McGill University.
“Those new Montreal hospitals, even those which haven’t opened yet, would be fantastic answers to the problems of the health care system of 10 years ago,”  “The projects took so long that now they aren’t the answer to the future.”
And there are a host of troubling trends in health care, according to Contandriopoulos. We are so obsessed with providing high-tech, advanced tertiary care that “normal care” has fallen by the wayside. Allowing a “mixed” system that enables private clinics to work acceptably alongside public institutions has led to the “disintegration” of the surrounding hospitals.
In fact, says Contandriopoulos, Quebec’s health care system “is leading the way in only one thing: failure.”
And he cautions other provinces in Canada to learn from the mistakes here.
“The future is not going to be easy,” said Contandriopoulos, an associate professor in nursing at the Institut de recherche en santé publique de l’Université de Montréal who is also an expert in public policy. “If you look at the airline industry 20 years ago, flying was pleasant. Now it’s horrible. Hospitals are headed in the same direction.”
Read the full story at the Montreal Gazette