Environmental Scan - Government of Nova Scotia

24 SURGICAL DISCIPLINES24.1 NationalPhysician Resource PlanningAn Environmental ScanThe following figure quantifies the number of surgical specialty FTEs by province. The figure adjusts FTEs fornon-FFS payments to allow reasonable inter-provincial comparison. This analysis is a significant improvementon the traditional population per count of physicians.Figure 177 Surgical Specialty Physician FTE 2008/09 – Interprovincial Comparison (Source: Adapted from CIHI)The next figure identifies the ratio of population per 1.0 surgeon FTE. Ontario and Nova Scotia have the lowestratio of population per 1.0 surgeon FTE. The Nova Scotia ratio is significantly higher than the national averagefor orthopaedics and plastic surgery and significantly lower for thoracic/cardiovascular, neurosurgery, andophthalmology.Figure 178 Surgical Specialty Physician Population per FTE 2008/09 – Interprovincial Comparison (Source: CIHI)The next two figures compare the total number of FFS services per 1.0 FFS FTE for all surgical specialties (i.e.Cardiac, General, Neurosurgery, O&G, Ophthalmology, Orthopaedic, Otolaryngology, Plastic, Thoracic, Urology,and Vascular Surgery combined) by province. Ontario and Quebec represent 65% of the total national surgicalFTEs. Alternate payment paid services and related FTEs are not included. The impact of non-FFS paid servicesand related FTEs being excluded is significant and caution must be exercised in interpreting the CIHI data. ForNova Scotia in 2008/09 only 12% of total payments to surgeons were non-FFS related and 27% of those220 | Page Social Sector Metrics Inc. & Health Intelligence Inc. | 12/31/2011