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The physician cycle continues

You can forgive local residents for having a feeling of déjà vu, after the recent announcement that Estevan’s gynecologist, Dr. Ahmad Sawwan, has decided to leave the community.

You can forgive local residents for having a feeling of déjà vu, after the recent announcement that Estevan’s gynecologist, Dr. Ahmad Sawwan, has decided to leave the community.

After all, it feels like a never-ending cycle that this city has been part of. Approach a physician. Bring the physician to the community. Do what you can to help the physician feel at home. And, eventually, watch that physician leave the community.

Repeat.

In the case of Sawwan, he will have spent about two years in Estevan when he moves on at the end of last month. As an obstetrician and gynecologist, his services are invaluable. And as such, there is no shortage of other communities looking to take him from Estevan, so that he can practice elsewhere.

It would have been nice to see him spend more than two years in Estevan, especially after he set up a women’s health clinic at St. Joseph’s Hospital a few months after arriving here. We had hoped that this was a positive sign regarding Sawwan’s potential longevity in the community.

But instead Sawwan is leaving, the latest physician to depart Estevan earlier than we would have liked. 

Of course, when news of Sawwan’s departure broke on the Mercury’s website, the keyboard warriors were out in full force, wondering why he would leave after two years in Estevan, and questioning the people who are in charge of the hospital.

But we have to remember that physicians are in short supply, and physicians like Sawwan are in even greater demand because he’s a specialist. It’s tough enough to attract family physicians to a community; it’s even harder to bring in specialists.

We’re already without a permanent full-time anesthesiologist, so Sawwan’s departure hurts even more.

The good news is Estevan does have Dr. Edward Krickan, who is well-versed in obstetrics and has been a highly-thought-of addition to the community. That will allow the hospital to maintain obstetric services. But Krickan also has a patient load that he needs to look after.

Sawwan’s departure means locum physicians coming to the community in the short-term, while the hospital looks for a more permanent replacement.

 It would be nice to have physicians come to Estevan, set up their practice, create long-lasting professional relationships with their patients, and spend the bulk of their careers here. There are a few doctors in Estevan who have done that over the years; we’ve been lucky to have them.

And in Sawwan’s case, it would have been great to have him here for several years.

But there’s no shortage of communities in the same position as Estevan. They move in and out of physician shortages. Sometimes they have enough physicians, or more than enough. But in many occasions, they find themselves on the brink of a shortage, or in a full-fledged physician deficiency.

They don’t have enough doctors for their community. And they’re looking for specialists who can provide additional services for their residents.

It means trying to bring in physicians from other communities.

It’s a competitive business, and if you have to put a couple of other communities in a shortage to fill your own needs, so be it.

You won’t find many professions more demanding than medical doctor. It requires years of school, and once you graduate, you move into a job that has long hours, high demands and great expectations. There’s no margin of error when you’re dealing with people’s health.

In the case of St. Joseph’s Hospital in Estevan, they can do all they can to attract new doctors and offer a fleet of incentives to keep those physicians here, but for many physicians, there are lifestyle opportunities in the bigger markets that Estevan can’t match.

A never-ending effort to recruit physicians is ultimately the only way we’re going to avoid another physician shortage in Estevan.