Tom Beaulieu

The Department of Health or the health authorities have recently improved the electronic health records. Electronic health records can be used and transmitted from community to community electronically.

Clinical decisions are generally made by medical practitioners such as nurses and so on. However, if there are cases where individuals are sick, and they’re coming to the health centre and they are being treated for pain and sent home, then I think that the message has to go out from us to the health authorities, that that type of practice should not be continued. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As I had indicated previously in questions about the cancer rates in Fort Good Hope, our attention is to pay attention to that, as well as other communities which have come forward as a result of questionings from the Member as you hear in the House, and we’re working with the chief public health officer within the department to develop some sort of strategy to address the issue.

Now, in as far as the actual testing goes, I’m familiar with how that process works, but if there is testing to be done in Fort Good Hope about cancer, we’ll do it.

Although I can’t come up with an exact, specific date, I can say that because we are moving into prevention, and one of the keys to health prevention of illnesses is having good teeth to be able to chew your food properly and that is very important. The department sees that as one of the essential services that are needed at the community level. So we’re moving onto that as quickly as possible. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Finding dentists in the Northwest Territories is a difficult task. We have great dental care in some of the regional centres; that is a fact. It is difficult to get dentists in other areas and that’s the reason for the huge backlog, because even offering out tenders… The various authorities at the regional level put out tenders and we’re not getting a good response. When we do get a response, people come in. That’s exactly the type of work that the dentists are doing. They’re trying to play catch-up. It’s very difficult for dentists to put together a good plan with one...

The testing that occurred in another community that the Member refers to was testing for something else that may have been easy to test at the community level. I’m not sure how easy it is to test for cancer, but what we can do is have the department make it very clear to the health authorities and health centres that catching cancer at stage 1 is the most efficient way, has the greatest possibility of curing the individual and the least expense to the public purse when we are able to catch cancer at the first stage and not the fifth stage. So that message can be sent to the health authorities...

I think that anyone who wishes to go for testing through a lab and through the physician, the physician essentially fills out a form, and individuals going to the lab get all the tests necessary that get fed back to the doctor. In the case where we go into a community to do testing, I’m not 100 percent sure that we do that specific type of testing, which I will check into. I know that the one method, for sure, is for individuals to go to the doctor, then to the lab and then get the results back to the patient that way. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

At this point we’re using a referral through the health and social services authorities across the regions to have the individual approach them and then them going through the system. In cases where individuals are coming directly to find their own dental services, like driving into a community where there are good dentists or when they arrive in the communities where they know there are good dentists and approach them themselves, they have not sorted that specific issue out at this time, but we’re working on sorting out those issues as well.

The model that we talked about today, this morning in fact, meeting with the Tlicho Community Services Agency where they have a dental therapist on staff, and the dental therapist works at the school and works in the community, and in that way just a little higher level than just a dental hygienist which will work in advance of the dentist. That dental therapist does do some of the dental work but not the work of a full dentist. The goal would be to move in that direction, try to get dental therapists into the communities and that should alleviate those backlogs at the community level. Thank...

Mahsi cho, Mr. Speaker. In setting the priorities for this new government, we have placed an emphasis on education and prevention, and on mental health and addictions. I am pleased to report that we are already moving forward with a new campaign in this area.

This morning we launched the My Voice, My Choice campaign to help young people and those who support them to speak up about addictions in the Northwest Territories. We all know addictions are a destructive force in our territory that reaches beyond the individuals who are struggling with this problem. We see the effects in our communities...