Freedom of Information Data - Health Budget and actual expenditures 2022- March 2023
Take a look over this Freedom of Information release that outlines budgets and actually expenditures across BC Health Centres, including Urgent Primary Care Centres (UPCC) and Community Health Centres (CHC). CLICK
Some note worth numbers are:
UPCC Victoria Downtown budgeted $371,429 for Nurse Practitioners, spent $0
UPCC Esquimalt budgeted $2.1 Million for Family Physician, $0 spent. Budgeted $137,000 for Nurse Practitioners and $0 spent.
Within Island Health several UPCCs have over spending in OVERHEAD, ranging from $500,000-$900,000 more than budgeted.
This data seems to suggest that part of the reason you may not get in to a Urgent Primary Care Centre may be because they don’t have any Family Physician or Nurse Practitioner on staff. Register Nurses can often be found working at UPCCs but they have a different scope of practice that limits the patients they can see.
The data also raises concerns around spending and budgeting. We need to ensure the Government is spending money in ways that results in positive outcomes for the people and increases attachments to a primary care provider. If there’s no Family Doctor or NPs being paid at a centre then why are they over spending $600,000 on overhead? Money spent on infrastructure isn’t the same as money spent on increasing access to healthcare.