{"id":950334,"date":"2026-10-29T06:46:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-29T06:46:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/950334\/"},"modified":"2026-10-29T06:46:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T06:46:14","slug":"nlma-says-provinces-continued-reliance-on-virtual-care-a-symptom-of-ongoing-doctor-shortage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/950334\/","title":{"rendered":"NLMA says Province\u2019s Continued Reliance on Virtual Care a Symptom of Ongoing Doctor Shortage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t&#13;<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Stethoscope-Doctor-Health-Medicine.jpg\" class=\"header-image\" alt=\"NLMA says Province's Continued Reliance on Virtual Care a Symptom of Ongoing Doctor Shortage\"\/>\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p>The NL Medical Association says the use of Teladoc, a virtual medical service, is accelerating in Newfoundland and Labrador, and that\u2019s of serious concern.  <\/p>\n<p>The NLMA says the province\u2019s growing reliance on private virtual care is a symptom of an ongoing doctor shortage.<\/p>\n<p>Association President Dr. David Metcalfe says virtual care was \u201cnever intended\u201d to replace a patient\u2019s access to a family physician or become a permanent substitute for emergency care. <\/p>\n<p>Instead, three years after the program was first introduced, more communities are depending on the virtual platform to keep emergency departments open. <\/p>\n<p>Metcalfe says that\u2019s not a sign of success and it\u2019s not the standard patients should expect in a modern health care system. <\/p>\n<p>The NLMA has been calling for the release of a comprehensive physician health human resource plan since 2018 which includes targets for the number and distribution of needed physicians across the province.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"&#13; The NL Medical Association says the use of Teladoc, a virtual medical service, is accelerating in Newfoundland&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":950335,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,84,392,269876,185074,269873,269875,269877,269874,269870,269871,269872],"class_list":["post-950334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-listen-to-vocm","tag-news-radio","tag-news-radio-st-johns","tag-st-johns-fm-radio","tag-st-johns-local-radio","tag-st-johns-radio-station","tag-vocm","tag-vocm-590","tag-vocm-radio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=950334"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950334\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/950335"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=950334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=950334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=950334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}