Thoughts on Modernizing the Canada Health Act

The Canada Health Act (CHA) was initiated in 1984. The CHA's universal coverage only encompasses "medically necessary" services provided by hospitals and physicians, and as a result exclude many other essential health care services (Flood and Thomas, 2016). As a Registered Nurse, I believe healthcare should be effective, equitable, safe, and most of all patient-centered. Therefore, just as I must ensure that I am adapting and tailoring my care to the needs of diverse populations, so must the CHA.

Flood and Thomas (2016) mention that not only should the CHA expand to include a wider variety of health services such as outpatient care and diagnostic services, but also designate a taskforce to evaluate the ever-changing needs of the Canadian population every few years. In effect, the CHA will remain up-to-date by evolving along with the health needs of the populations it was adopted to serve. Furthermore, unlike other countries that have created thorough processes for evaluating cost effective health goods and services, the CHA continues to remain changeless. I believe the federal government would benefit from being more flexible and potentially experimenting with health policies that are effective in other countries to find a solution that best meets the health needs of Canadians (Flood and Thomas, 2016).

As a community health nurse, I have the privilege to work in primary care. Primary care is considered first contact care and is essential to disease prevention, early detection and health management (Starfield, Shi, Macinko, 2005). Many lower income Canadians are unable to afford health care services that fall outside of the CHA's universal coverage, and as a result suffer major health incidences and even death (Flood and Thomas, 2016). If more funding is provided to the primary care sector to support early detection, disease prevention, and prescription medicine, I believe less funding would be spent on “medically necessary” procedures and surgeries. This may provide more flexibility to allocate funds to other health care services and allow the CHA to potentially expand its universal coverage.

References

Flood, C. M., & Thomas, B. (2016). Modernizing the Canada Health Act, 39, 1–16.

https://doi.org/https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2907029

Starfield, B., Shi, L., & Macinko, J. (2005). Contribution of primary care to health systems and

health. The Milbank quarterly, 83(3), 457–502. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-

0009.2005.00409.x