$2.6 billion South Shore future hospital in need of doctors, much like the rest of Quebec

Future Vaudreuil-Soulanges Hospital in need of doctors before it opens in two years.

The opening of the new Vaudreuil-Soulange Hospital west of Montreal is still two years away, but there are already concerns about recruiting doctors.

It is one of Quebec’s most significant health-care projects in decades.

“It’s an opportunity to, re-stabilize, the capacity according to the growth of the population,” said CISSS Monteregie West medical director Dr. Caroline Bourassa-Fulop.

The hospital will add more than 400 new beds to a region that is currently underserved. The local health authority (CISSS) expects it will have to recruit about 230 physicians to make it fully operational.

“It is a net addition to the health-care capacity here in the region,” said Bourassa-Fulop. “So we are not switching over or transferring, so that increases that challenge of it all.”

The province is currently short around 2,000 family doctors, and the federation of general practitioners isn’t sure where the new recruits are going to come from.

“What we really need to do is attract more residents into [the] family medicine residency program,” said spokesperson Dr. Lyne Couture.

When asked about recruitment issues, Premier Christine Fréchette said the province is training more doctors.

“We have increased the number of physicians that are being formed annually of 40 per cent in 2023,” she said. “So there are going to be, more people available to work in the different hospital centres.”

Couture said a two-year period is too short.

“You know, it takes at least seven years to form a family physician,” she said.

Couture says that fewer med school graduates are going into family medicine. This year alone, there are 100 vacant family medicine residency positions.

“That’s more than 100 family physicians that we will not have in a two-year period when the hospital opens, so it’s it’s it’s a major concern for us,” she said.

For the Monteregie health authority tasked with staffing the new state-of-the-art hospital, a key to success will be looking outside of Quebec.

“We have international recruitment efforts [ongoing],” said Bourassa-Fulop. “We are talking with physicians who are interested, to come to the new hospital.”

The plan is to open the hospital in phases over a three to five-year period, allowing some extra time to fill positions.

The $2.6 billion hospital is expected to be a major economic driver for the region, with significant housing and infrastructure already under construction in anticipation of an influx of new workers.