By Kevin Gilby
CRAIK—Minister of Rural and Remote Health Greg Ottenbreit made an impromptu stop at the health centres in Davidson and Craik, Tuesday, Jan. 27.
“On our way through, we stopped in, and had an impromptu tour of the Craik facility, and ended up speaking with the doctor there, we got a little bit of a tour from his perspective,” Ottenbreit said. “I’ve had a few different invitations, many via email, to come out and look at the [Craik] facility.”
RM of Craik Reeve Hilton Spencer happened to be in the health centre at the time and was “very happy to see him there.”
After his stop in Craik, Ottenbreit then stopped in Davidson and touched base with Dr. Lang. He toured their facilities “so we can have a first hand perspective on what the facilities are like.”
Ottenbreit said, “They are both great little facilities serving the areas for a long time in a really good fashion. I was glad I looked at both so you can really see what their residents were telling us.”
During his visits with the physicians, he to listened to some of their concerns about the proposed three-physician group practice as well as possible concerns over contractual matters.
Subsequent to the visits, the doctors accepted an invitation to speak further about their concerns in the Health Ministry offices in Regina the following day. Ottenbreit said the dialogue was productive and believes that “it’s progressing fairly positively at this point.”
One of the issues Ottenbreit wanted to impress upon the doctors was the benefits of working in a group practice. In particular, he said based on experiences from other group environments, physicians find it beneficial to have someone contractually being able to support them for holidays, sick leaves, training, or any other need that may arise.
Ottenbreit said that Dr. Karam may have felt that the work on establishing a contract was being held up but he assured him that any delay was due to it being “such a moving target.” Furthermore, a draft contract was written on Jan. 23 and forwarded to Dr. Karam for his consideration.
According to Ottenbreit, the draft is a three party contract between the physician, the Five Hills Health Region (FHHR), and the Heartland Health Region (HHR). Under the contract, Dr. Karam would be providing his regular office hours in Craik Health Centre four days a week as well as providing some on-call coverage for emergency and acute care in the Davidson Health Centre.
Previously, FHHR was proposing Dr. Karam sign a contract with the HHR whereupon his services would be ‘hired’ back to the community of Craik. “Because of the division between regions,” Ottenbreit said, “Legally, it was hard to contract it like Five Hills initially wanted.”
To read more, please see the Feb. 2, 2015 print edition of The Davidson Leader.

CRAIK—The barn at Riskan Hope Farm is looking better these days.
A fresh coat of paint now covers the weather worn wood siding and new asphalt shingles have replaced the original cedar shakes.
“It was getting in pretty rough shape,” says its owner Dave Luther. “With cattle prices up a bit, I decided I had to do something. It’s a landmark.”
Cattle prices are at record highs. Luther said he sold a bunch of cows in the spring to local producers and put some of the profits back into the old barn.
He wants it looking good for its 100th birthday in 2019.
Years of hard work are finally paying off for Canadian cattle producers like the Luthers.
A shortage of cattle in the U.S. due to drought and harsh winters and declining herd sizes in Canada have pushed up beef prices.
According to Statistics Canada, Canadian beef and veal exports to the U.S. were up by 11 per cent in 2014 compared to 2013.
The published price of 700-800 pound feeder steers in Saskatchewan, according to Saskatchewan Agriculture, was $250.50 (per cwt) as of Jan. 23, compared to $163.10 a year ago.
Alberta Beef Producers predict beef supplies to tighten further this year due to strong North American and global demand.
It’s a welcome trend for an industry that has spent more than a decade recovering from the BSE crisis that began in May 2003.
Luther said back in 2003 a breeding cow was worth about $300 and “slaughter cows then were worth nothing. Farmers almost had to pay them to take them.”
As a result many farmers got out of raising livestock.
“I can count 10 guys without any problem around here who got out of them because of BSE and they’ll never get back into them,” Luther said.
With the demand high, butcher John Sperling said by summer he may have trouble sourcing beef to stock his local butcher shop JMR Meats in Davidson.
Much of the meat he sells is the product of local farms. He said the price of beef is up by a third over last year. In 2014 a side of beef cut and wrapped was selling for between $2.79 and $2,89 a pound. Now it’s retailing at $4/lb.