The crisis in LTC/SL4 is deepening. More deaths from neglect this week. This information gets obscured by demands of patient confidentiality, and the patient group being unseen (how can you be seen when you can’t leave, can’t speak, can’t reason). Many don’t have families…2 2…they reside in facilities that are horribly under-staffed. The nurses there practicing war-zone care. The paramedics and doctors helping out have to try to be at 8 facilities at the same time. The crises start to stack on top of each other…3

@CPSA_CA, I hear you are in trouble. I hear your days are numbered, and as such, the days of doctors being self-regulated in this province.

Whomever of you that may read this...I want you to think on this: the CPSA's official position on disallowing family doctors to partake...2 2...in job action is partially to blame for where we are now (that includes the precariousness of your future existence). By making it so dire for family doctors to take action to represent themselves, you have inadvertently allowed a corrupt govt to take us to...3

I am a family doctor in Red Deer Alberta. Yesterday a wheelchair-bound patient of mine came to the clinic to have a cyst removed off his leg that was causing him lots of troubles. There was no plausible way to get him on a table...2 2...Referring him to a specialist at a hospital with support staff to get him on the table would have cost months if not years in time, many hundreds in specialist fees, maybe thousands in hospital fees...3

Dear moderate Alberta conservatives that are uncomfortable with where the UCP has gone: realize the party won’t splinter while in power. You will not be able to eject the RWNJs until the UCP are ejected from power…2 2…But the moment they do get ejected they will indeed splinter apart. Every day that the moderates and the extremists remain “united” is another day the rest of the province/country sees you as indistinguishable from each other…3

A vote for the @Alberta_UCP is a vote for not being involved in selecting the next premier…2 2…a vote for @ABDanielleSmith is a vote for letting @takebackalberta install anyone they damn-well please after the election…3

Today the contract between @YourAlberta and @Albertadoctors is either ratified or not. Within this contract is formal structures to allow the govt to set up "relationships" with large corporate shareholder-beholden companies entering into healthcare delivery...2 2...It creates a situation where "docs", where-ever they are in the world, can be employed by these corps, but can only gain employee representation if they can track each other down and get 50%+1 to agree to cooperate on seeking representation (without knowing what 50%+1 is)...3

Alta docs, contemplating the upcoming contract negotiations with the UCP: As I do my Sunday labs, it occurs to me how HUGE of a backlog we have in getting our standard of care back to where it was pre-2019…2 2… And it is likely being made worse, not better, day by day as more docs leave and fewer docs come to Alberta. Despite me drastically extending my hours of work, the care needs outpace my abilities to deliver…3

1..To all those supporting “the convoy” for it’s attempt to give you back your freedoms. Well, you had your rally, what did you accomplish? Get your freedoms back? Probably not, b/c Ottawa hadn’t taken any to have to give back..2 2.. If a govt is going to take a freedom from you, the first one they will take is the right to public protest and free association. Isn’t it ironic how the freedom convoy was able to make it to Ottawa without being arrested?..3

1...I think Albertans of “both sides” can come together on this.

First, lets be clear. @AHS_media = @dryiu_verna = @CMOH_Alberta = @JasonCoppingAB = @Shandro = @GoAHealth = @YourAlberta = @UCPCaucus = @Jkenney*. One entity, one strategy.
...2 2...We have been a victim of an offensive perversion of “our democracy”.

Regardless if you side with/against vaccines, with/against social distancing/restrictions, schools open/closed etc etc
One thing holds true.
...3

1/ With the recent attempted soft stance on Nazism being pushed by @Jkenney's @UCPCaucus @YourAlberta w/ @AdrianaLaGrange, does anyone one find this particularly disturbing. Disturbing when you think this is a long game /2 2/ A long game in that you don't indoctrinate grade schoolers to win votes in 2 year's time. This is an attempt to soften fascist trends for decades to come. What govt ever plans out past the next election?!? Clearly this isn't in @Alberta_UCP's best interest /3

1…I’ve had a choice number of people reach out to me to sincerely ask me to stay in Alberta. I didn’t realize so many of my actual patients followed me on Twitter. Many who know me personally know I’m just an average joe who managed to transition from…2 2…from construction work (and academia) into medicine. I am not stoic. I am not always ‘proper’. To my patients: please realize that was a really really low couple of days for me. But, I did not mean to turn this into an “I’m leaving!” dramatic publicity stunt…3

1…Tonight my dog died. Metastatic Cancer. Not the only case of cancer currently brewing in my family. Had to put her down. As I held her and felt her last breath, I realized how hellish my work-life balance had become this last year…2 2…Don’t get me wrong, medicine has always been tough to find work-life balance. Notoriously. But, we had been making inroads as a profession to attain that balance. But, when UCP came along that all halted. Then COVID came along and that was shattered into a million…3

1…In the lead up to WWII, Hitler engaged in a campaign of “re-uniting the Germanic Peoples”, and Lebensraum (“living space”). Despite the rest of the world watching him (esp France, England, USA, Russia), he was able to hostiley annex (though without a single shot fired)…2 2…He was able to annex Austria, and approx 80% of Czechoslovakia’s industry and resources.

Through:
A) a slick PR campaign
B) “Divide and conquer” politics
C) unwavering ideology

He gained the power and righteous delusion to take the world to the brink of destruction
…3

1…Discussed with an immunologist: new variants are appearing with mutations in the human tissue receptor portion of COVID, which is also the portion of the spike protein that the vaccine-induced antibodies (AKA your immune system)…2 2…while this does not increase the infectivity or virulence (disease severity) or the virus, it could lead to significant decrease in vaccine effectiveness…3

1...I think it is official...the "contract" offered the docs by @shandro is not actually a contract. Its an autograph book that Shandy wants to collect COVID-hero signatures in. It is so vague that this contract lawyer of a minister...2 2...has generated a document that can't be legally upheld as a contract by any self-respecting contract court.

@shandro can't even do his original job as a lawyer correctly

1...For those wanting a little context on how @jkenney failed us all because of corruption and TOTAL LACK OF VISION. In April 2020, when the world knew COVID was about to lay us all to ruin, and many were already singing the praises of vaccine development...2 2...@jkenney and the @UCPCaucus @YourAlberta government sunk what was left of our heritage fund into the CEO pockets of O&G companies waiting on the doorstep to leave. Canada had no vaccine production capacity, Alberta was leading the country in unemployment...3

1...Sometimes a little context is in order. Realize that while our Minister of COIs has presented the AMA with a contract “good for everyone”, here is a person who felt fine to trespass on a neighbour’s property, threaten them and their family because they were a doctor...2 2...with an opinion on his ulterior motives (owning a private health insurance company). He has harassed multiple doctors, he has demanded punishment from the college for any doc that has opposed him...3

1...@shandro, @jkenney, @ucpcaucus have engaged the AMA for further contract talks. We doctors are finding ourselves soon to be voting on a contract we don’t even yet know the details of. Meanwhile, the govt (and the AMA) have asked us to not discuss the details...2 2...with the public (once we know them), as a show of good faith. However, in the last 3-4 days we have seen numerous “UCP-allies” publish articles taking shots at docs, we have heard the Minister proclaim Bill 21 isn’t a threat to contracts, and UCP MLAs email their...3

1...As a doctor I am morally very concerned that the @UCPCaucus intention to open up Alberta (just as the hyper-infectious variants descend upon the province) is going to push our system deeply back into overburdened, slowing down services and costing people time and life...2 2...in seeking care for their mortal illnesses, resources that will be exhausted caring for people who could have avoided getting COVID.

However....

...3

1...@AHS_media @UCPCaucus @shandro
I have had multiple patients now test + for COVID, without me being notified. AHS has a protocol they want family docs to follow where we contact patients at home every 2 days to ensure patients are coping/recovering...2 2...That's the extent of the healthcare people are being offered at first contact. However, if AH doesn't even notify the GPs of their patient's status, not even this can be acted upon. This is ignoring the huge burden this is on GPs...3

1...As a free person I took 2 weeks off over Christmas and New Years. As a family doctor I needed to continued to attend to the health needs of my patients, especially in nursing homes, sacrificing my stay-cation. As a frontline health worker, I specifically saw and cared...2 2...for a patient who ultimately passed away from COVID 2 days ago. While others dashed away from the house fire of COVID, I charged in (with full PPE). Then, I hear the same UCP govt that accused me as over entitled and a burden to the healthcare system...3