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KAMLOOPS - There are 1,200 openings remaining at the NorKam Healthcare Centre, but if you want one you will have to go to the clinic in person as they will not be calling people on the HealthLink B.C. waiting list.

Manager Patti Aldrich says the Practice Ready Assessment program that brought the new doctors to town and the 8-1-1 hotline that is used to link patients with doctors are not under the purview of the same health agencies so the two programs don't communicate with each other.

Aldrich says HealthLink B.C. is running a completely different program.

"They are running a nurse practitioner program through primary care centres. When you call 8-1-1 it's to get your name on the list for any doctor that they might have come in under Interior Health," she says. "More predominantly they're lining up for the nurse practitioners that they're employing as primary care providers within their clinics."

Because the NorKam clinic is a private doctors office they are not part of the Interior Health Authority run 8-1-1 program, though Aldrich says if you do become a patient of one of the new doctors you should call 8-1-1 to have your name removed from the wait list.

Residents who didn't get the call they were expecting still have a great chance to land one of the three new physicians. Aldrich says they are continuing to accept patients and will take a total of at least 3,000 but could add more. All you have to do is go to the clinic to fill out a medical history form and it's basically first come, first serve.

"It's not an application, it's simply a synopsis of the patients medical history," she says. "The forms are kept in line and date stamped. Within those dates we will look at them and triage so if we have somebody who's healthy and 31 years old come in the same day as a person who takes multiple medications to manage their multiple conditions, the second person will get the appointment first."

Once the medical forms are handed in, prospective patients can expect a call to set up a meeting with one of the doctors to see if they are a good fit for the patients needs.

All three of the new doctors have operated their own family practice in other countries. As part of the Practice Ready Assessment program they have spent several years and tens of thousands of dollars of their own money in Canada while working on their College of Physicians accreditation.

For more on the Kamloops doctors shortage, go here.

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