Pontiac doctors pen open letter regarding imagery technician pay disparity

Pontiac doctors pen open letter regarding imagery technician pay disparity

A group of Pontiac physicians have penned an open letter to Quebec’s Health Minister Christian Dubé, requesting that he urgently address the pay disparities for imagery technicians working at the Pontiac Hospital and other facilities in the region. The letter was published in this week’s edition of The Equity newspaper.

“We are proud of the services we can still offer to the people of the Pontiac, but with a major salary disadvantage for our technicians, we risk losing them and finding ourselves without these services,” they wrote. “If the radiology department closes, it will lead to increased traffic and additional pressure on the Gatineau and Hull hospitals (emergency, surgery, trauma, neuro-stroke, etc.). The risk of death for our population will be higher, not to mention the delay in diagnosis.”

Dr. John Wootton, who oversees the region’s family medicine group and has worked in the Pontiac since 1983 was one of the seven physicians who signed the letter, along with the hospital’s head surgeon, chief of anesthesiology and chief of the emergency department. He said that subjecting local technicians to a “political dogfight” is unacceptable and putting a lot of strain on the local network.

Dr. Wootton pointed to the crisis that occurred in Quebec’s Côte-Nord region this spring as an example of political decisions in health care having a disastrous impact on a rural region.

Despite these challenges, Dr. Wootton reiterated he was proud of the services that they are still able to offer in Pontiac, and said if given the proper resources they can provide high quality care locally.

The full interview with Dr. Wootton (8m35) is available here.