The Martlet

Students now need to book an appointment to see a doctor at UVic’s Health Services.

Health Services, located in the Jack Petersen Health Centre in parking lot 5, switched over to an appointment-based system in mid-August. Previously, they operated as a walk-in clinic.

Health Services Director Dr. William Dyson said one of the major reasons for making the switch was to reduce student wait times.

“If you add up all of the 20-plus thousand people we see in a year, how many hours did each of those people spend waiting in our waiting room?” asked Dyson. “My prime intention here is to reduce the amount of time people spend in our waiting area.”

Dyson said that, not only will reducing waiting times allow people to spend more time focusing on their academic studies, but it will also reduce the chance of people picking up infectious illness while in the waiting room.

Booking appointments will also allow Health Services to make better use of its resources, according to Dyson. He said that patients tend to come in waves, and that the early morning period is often under-utilized.

“With an appointment system we can now assign people to those times,” he said. “We’re making better use of our resources here by spreading things throughout the day.”

Currently, Health Services is booking primarily same-day appointments.

“We’re focusing on a same-day appointment system because there’s going to be a learning curve here for students and for us,” Dyson said. “We’re a little bit concerned that there could be too many no shows if people were phoning in for appointments too far ahead of time.”

However, in the case of a follow-up appointment, an advance appointment can be booked.

To book an appointment, students can either walk-in to the clinic or call the booking line at 250-721-8492.

“People come in, they’re given a specific time,” said Dyson. “It’s whatever fits their schedule.”

While Dyson said there were a few initial bugs to work out, particular with the computer systems, Health Services is now ready for things to pick up with students coming back to campus for the fall session.

“We’re giving it its trial by fire — starting anytime now,” he said.

While August is typically much quieter than September, Dyson said student feedback on the new system has been overwhelmingly positive.

“So far we have about 99 per cent approval here–it’s astonishing,” he said.

For more information on UVic’s Health Services, visit health.uvic.ca.