Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My name is Andrew Padmos. I'm a physician specialist in hematology and the chief executive of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, an organization created by a special act of Parliament in 1929 to represent the public interest in choosing and defining “specialists” in medical and surgical practices. We have 42,000 members, 30,000 in active practice in Canada. We're known for setting standards in the public interest and overseeing the education and certification of all specialists, with the exception of our colleagues in family medicine.
It's my privilege today to expand on four recommendations in our brief: firstly, to create a pan-Canadian health human resource observatory to leverage our human resource investment in health care; to support the further invigoration of research to retain thought leadership in this huge and important industry; to support leading innovation to develop leading practice that is going to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of health care; and lastly, to dignify our aboriginal peoples to provide a continuum of health care as a model supported by the federal government, a model expected by all Canadians.
Our first recommendation concerns an observatory for health human resources. Our colleagues from industry and business would consider it laughable, if not catastrophic, to see an industry the size of health care, nearly $200 billion a year, that expends literally nothing on tracking its most expensive resource—that is, the health human resources in our personnel, and not just physicians but all categories—although we spend 70¢ of every health care dollar on personnel costs.
We're facing incredible changes in the health care environment and we have no means to track the directions or the ramifications of these, including a great sucking noise from the south of us because of the health care improvement act in the United States. They look to Canada as the best and most able source of health human resources to fill a huge gap they have.
We also have expended very little time, energy, or effort on deciphering what the impact of electronic tools and resources will be in health care. We know a little bit about Google Health, but we don't know very much about when the electronic records will be established in Canada for all practitioners and all patients.
We want to ensure that Canadians have the best of health care through innovation and research, and yet our investments in health care research fall far behind those of our neighbours to the south. The importance of this also impacts on health care human resources, because now there are over 3,500 Canadian-trained Canadian physicians in the United States, where they have taken up residence because of the improved opportunities for research and for practice.
We'd like to promote innovation in health care and recommend the establishment of a body at the federal level, working in a pan-Canadian environment, to boost productivity and to examine and disseminate information about leading practices. Again, our colleagues in the United States have invested heavily in this area, and we have some examples in our provinces, such as the Saskatchewan Health Quality Council, which has adopted collaborative methods. These are spreading in other provinces as well.
Lastly, we want and we call for investment in the health and well-being of Canada's aboriginal peoples. We invite you to consider a community near you where heart disease occurs one and a half times more commonly than in your family home; where diabetes is three to five times more prevalent; where tuberculosis occurrence is ten times more likely; where the life expectancy of women is less than that of other groups of women by six years; where infant mortality is twice that of the general population. These figures are a stark reality in a call for federal action. The government's $285 million commitment to aboriginal health initiatives in Budget 2010 isn't enough. We ask that the government extend its support for the aboriginal health human resources initiative funding, which was announced in 2010, beyond its two-year term, considering the long lead time required to make these recommendations come forward.
Thank you for the opportunity. We look forward to any questions you might have.