Healthcare

My 94-year-old mother and I are sitting in a southwest Calgary medical office and settling in to spend the day. It will be a long one but by the time we leave, my mother will have a new right eye [...]

Life is filled with surprises. So, on the day that I drove my brother, Olivier, to emergency to be treated for a psychotic episode, during that evening when we sat in emergency for nearly 12 [...]

A country that prides itself on its universal healthcare system has a glaring coverage gap: pharmaceutical drugs. As doctors and academics in this field, we see the consequences. Take, for [...]

It was the summer of 2015, and Hanne Schafer—a 65-year-old Calgarian psychologist who loved opera and camping and her husband of nine years—decided it was time. Over the previous two years, [...]

Just tell them we don’t have it here.” That’s what the nurse told me in Killam Hospital, an hour east of Camrose. I’d asked what would happen if a woman came into our ER asking for the [...]

An epic battle is underway in a Vancouver courtroom, with doctors, patients and experts clashing over how best to meet the healthcare needs of Canadians. Less visible—but nonetheless central to [...]

If you’re like most Canadians, you probably don’t care how your doctor gets paid as long as you receive the help you need and the government picks up the tab. But Dr. John Chmelicek thinks you [...]

The lights are hurting more than the knife. I’m on the operating table, with Dr. Bryce Ford looking down at me through a massive microscope, which is the source of those painfully bright lights. [...]

My son’s diagnosis of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder and our family’s consequent chaotic home life were shameful secrets before Gabrielle, the newest member of my work carpool, vented about her [...]

My wake-up call came on June 22, 2013, when Victim Services volunteers dropped me off at a local emergency room after a violent assault in which I was whipped and choked, my neck cracked and my [...]