Sackville mayoralty candidate Shawn Mesheau is calling for a regional citizens’ committee to represent the needs of Tantramar area residents when it comes to health care. Mesheau also thinks the town of Sackville can contribute to the recruitment of health care professionals and the potential for a collaborative health care centre to serve the region.

Mesheau says he’d like to see a regional health care committee developed so that the local voice on health care issues is more consistent over time. “What I hope to achieve here with the help of many others, is to ensure that we have something that is sustained over time, to keep that voice in place about healthcare, not just in Sackville, but in the region here.”

Mesheau says a regional health care committee could provide, “a voice that will be there, no matter who is a mayor, who is a councillor, who is a doctor. Something that I have found over time is that we’ve lost sight of that, and we seem to be reactionary.”

Mesheau sees a regional reach for the committee covering the provincial riding of Memramcook-Tantramar.

Mesheau says one of the things he learned during the breakout sessions of the first round of healthcare consultations in Sackville on March 4 was that if you live in one community, “you don’t necessarily understand the needs of another community.”

“We need to approach everybody and find out who are the key people that should be involved,” says Mesheau. “And over time, I foresee this not being politicized. I don’t think politics should play a role in healthcare.” Except, of course, for politicians to help ensure that the committee’s activities are heard and connected with decision makers.

“That’ll be the hurdle for any sort of committee,” says Mesheau, “being heard and being recognized by the health authority.”

When it comes to recruitment of medical professionals, including doctors, nurses, lab technicians and other health care workers, Mesheau says the town should play a role, and that the university could play a role. “Is there opportunity that we can work with [Mount Allison] to maybe get a graduating student or students to consider Sackville?” wonders Mesheau.

Mesheau also thinks the town and university may have a role to play in creating a new type of health centre for delivering primary care, something that’s not just focussed on solo practitioners, “but having kind of a group approach to it,” says Mesheau, to allow for after hours care.

“Is there an opportunity to work with the university on developing, you know, an after hours clinic, maybe on campus that would be accessible to the general public as well besides student population?” asks Mesheau. “I think there’s opportunity to have those conversations. I don’t think we’ve explored it enough and I hope that’s what we can do.”

As a cancer survivor, Mesheau has had his share of experience with the health care system in Sackville. In the process of diagnosis and treatment for kidney stones at the Sackville Hospital, a doctor found a tumour on one of Mesheau’s kidneys. For that, he had to head to Moncton to consult a specialist and get surgery.

“Because of the efforts of fundraising, they had a new surgery unit that they had just put into place,” says Mesheau. “And they were able to do the surgery laparoscopically. So it meant less recovery time for me.”

The major surgery still meant four days in recovery before Mesheau could return home. “And then the follow up afterwards was all through the clinic here in Sackville,” says Mesheau. “Annual checkups and x-rays and blood work all done here in Sackville.”

Though his tumour was found to be cancerous, Mesheau managed to avoid chemotherapy. He was given the all clear on his cancer after about 5 or 6 years, and admits he was lucky the tumour was caught in time. “It could have progressed to a certain point that I could have lost my entire kidney, and it could have spread elsewhere,” he says.

The experience was traumatic, says Mesheau, but he only has good things to say about the care he received and the health care workers involved.