Ontario Funds 38,000 New Family Doctor Spots

Most Ontarians without a family doctor already know the drill: a name on a waitlist, a walk-in clinic for anything urgent, and an emergency room visit when nothing else is open. This week, the province put real money behind changing that math — and it's worth knowing exactly what's on offer and how to use it while you wait.

What Ontario Just Announced

On August 7, Ontario announced a $15 million investment across four Scarborough primary care teams, aiming to connect close to 38,000 residents in the east end to a family doctor or primary care provider. The funding goes to TAIBU Community Health Centre, Scarborough Centre for Healthy Communities, Scarborough Academic Family Health Team, and HF Connecting Health Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic.

It's part of a much bigger push: Ontario's $3.4-billion Primary Care Action Plan, which targets primary care access for every resident by 2029. A related, smaller round of funding earlier this year — $4.8 million to two other Scarborough teams — already connected 13,600 people to care, beating its own target by a third. Provincewide, the latest funding round is expanding roughly 75 primary care teams and aims to connect 500,000 more people to a provider.

Scarborough is also getting a bigger emergency department: an $82-million, 36,000-square-foot expansion at Centenary Hospital, expected to add around 400 health-care jobs. Ontario says it has added more than 20,000 physicians to the system since 2018, 14% of them family doctors.

Why This Matters If You're Still Unattached

"Unattached" is the term health planners use for anyone without a regular family doctor or nurse practitioner — and in Ontario, that's still millions of people. Being unattached usually means:

• Longer waits for anything that isn't an emergency, because there's no one coordinating your care
• More reliance on walk-in clinics and urgent care for things a family doctor would normally handle
• A higher chance of ending up in the ER for problems that didn't need to be emergencies

New funding doesn't attach you to a doctor overnight, but it does mean more spots are opening — and knowing how the intake process works puts you closer to the front of the line.

How to Get Connected to a Family Doctor

1. Register with Health Care Connect. This is Ontario's official matching service for unattached patients; the new Scarborough teams and others across the province draw from its waitlist. Registration is free and available at ontario.ca/HealthCareConnect.
2. Search for a family practice near you in the meantime. Community health centres and nurse practitioner-led clinics — like the ones funded this week — often have shorter intake timelines than a traditional solo practice, and some accept walk-ins for registration.
3. Check clinics by city if you're outside Scarborough. CanClinics' city directory lists walk-in, family, and urgent care options across Ontario, since this kind of funding is rolling out province-wide, not just in one neighbourhood.

What to Do While You Wait

Being on a waitlist doesn't mean going without care. A few practical options:

• Non-urgent illness or injury: A walk-in clinic can handle colds, minor infections, sprains, and prescription renewals without an appointment.
• Something more involved but not life-threatening: Urgent care clinics are built for exactly this gap — sprains that might be fractures, moderate infections, or symptoms that need same-day attention but aren't an emergency.
• Running low on medication: if you can't reach your previous doctor, many walk-in clinics and pharmacists can help with a short-term prescription refill until you're matched with a permanent provider.
• Considering the ER: before you go, it's worth checking current wait times at nearby emergency departments — Ontario ERs vary widely hour to hour, and a shorter-wait hospital or an urgent care visit can sometimes get you seen faster for non-emergencies.

When to Skip All of This and Go Straight to the ER

None of the above applies if you're dealing with a real emergency. Call 911 or go directly to the nearest emergency department for:

• Chest pain, pressure, or difficulty breathing
• Sudden weakness, numbness, slurred speech, or facial drooping (signs of stroke)
• Severe bleeding that won't stop
• Loss of consciousness or a serious head injury
• A medical emergency involving a child, infant, or pregnancy complication

Primary care access is about everything that happens before and after an emergency — it isn't a substitute for calling 911 when something is seriously wrong.

FAQ

How do I register for Health Care Connect? You can register online through Ontario's Health Care Connect service, by phone, or in person at some community health centres. It's free, and you stay on the list until you're matched or choose to withdraw.

How long is the wait for a family doctor in Ontario? It varies a lot by region and how quickly local clinics have capacity — the new Scarborough funding, for instance, is expected to connect thousands of people over the coming months rather than years, but there's no fixed timeline. Registering as early as possible, and using community health centres or nurse practitioner-led clinics, tends to shorten the wait.

What should I do if I need care before I'm matched with a doctor? Use a walk-in clinic or urgent care for non-emergencies, and don't hesitate to go to the ER or call 911 for anything urgent or life-threatening. Search CanClinics to find nearby options by type and hours.

Are walk-in clinics a permanent substitute for a family doctor? No — they're a good bridge for acute, one-off issues, but they don't provide the ongoing relationship, records continuity, and preventive care a family doctor or nurse practitioner does. Staying on the Health Care Connect waitlist while using walk-in care in the meantime is the recommended approach.

Find Care Near You

Whether you're waiting to be matched with a family doctor or just need care today, search CanClinics for walk-in clinics, urgent care, family practices, and more across Ontario — filter by type, hours, and distance to find what's open now.

This article is for general information about accessing healthcare services in Canada and is not medical advice. For a medical emergency, call 911 or go to the nearest emergency room.

— CanClinics Team

Source: NOW Toronto — "Ontario invests $15M to connect Scarborough residents to doctors"