Health Link Family or Emergency Medicine – OCTP & BBFE

Your Opportunity:
 

Discover a new, flexible way of practicing medicine! The Health Link Virtual MD/OCTP/BBFE team needs physicians who can provide caring, astute virtual assessments and care.

Health Link is a free health service and information line for Albertans with non-emergency health inquiries. The Outpatient Covid Therapy Program (OCTP), connects eligible callers experiencing mild Covid illness with a physician who will virtually assess and prescribe outpatient therapies, including Paxlovid and Remdesivir. Health Link has recently expanded to support Blood and Body Fluid Exposures (BBFE), which provides HIV PEP follow-up to patients across the province. While training is provided, you should already be comfortable doing phone and video assessments and charting patients using Connect Care.

You’ll use observation and listening skills, problem solving skills, and consultation skills to virtually assess patients and advise them on the most appropriate level of care to access, whether it’s visiting the emergency department, an urgent care centre, their primary care provider, or caring for their illness by themselves at home. In many cases this includes referrals to after-hours clinics and services, including some Primary Care Networks. As this is a virtual position, you can do this work from anywhere in the province. Read on for a full job description and to apply below.
 
Job Description: 
 

As a Health Link OCTP/BBFE/Virtual MD, you will follow well-established guidelines to provide clinical services through comprehensive virtual primary care assessments, health promotion and patient education, and support chronic disease management and treatment. This includes a focused or comprehensive medical history, and as appropriate, a video-based physical exam. This exam may include general appearance, work-of-breathing, joint colour and range of motion, hydration status, mental status exam, ability to bear weight, activity level, extra-ocular movements, facial symmetry, and tremors, among other aspects of the physical exam. In this role, you will assess and triage a patient’s health care needs, i.e. virtually managing patient care as appropriate, directing patients to urgent care centres or emergency departments if clinically indicated, or directing patients to primary care including pharmacies as clinically appropriate, etc.

You will review relevant lab results and/or medical records as appropriate via Netcare and where available, AHS medical records such as Connect Care, capturing documentation of all clinical care and advice provided. In this role, you may prescribe outpatient therapies, including Paxlovid and Remdesivir, providing support and advice to other physicians and community sites providing these outpatient treatments through RAAPID. You will also conduct virtual follow up with patients who have been started on HIV PEP under BBFE.

Virtual MD hours are between 0600 and 0200 daily. The OCTP line operates from 0800 to 1700 daily.  Shift length can vary 3-4 hours in length. Physicians hired under this program can expect to work a minimum of four (4) shifts per month, with two (2) of those shifts on the OCTP line.