The waiting room is stocked with magazines and a children's area, the front desk is ready and the doors have opened on a new private clinic in the Maidstone Mall.
The Stone-Cross Medical Clinic opened to book appointments on March 5th and to see patients on March 6th. Dr. Isabella Stander is the owner of the clinic. She has been living in Maidstone and practicing medicine in the area for four years.
She graduated in 2004 in South Africa and has been in practice since 2005.
"I know that there is a shortage of doctors in the area, everywhere, which makes it unfair to patients to close your practice to new patients. Everyone should have an opportunity to see a family physician," she said.
Stander's clinic is accepting new patients and expects to serve people from the Lloydminster and Maidstone areas.
"I worked in Lloydminster for the past year and just realised more how health care is needed in the rural areas. Bigger centres like Lloydminster have a hospital and emergency room with a lot of clinics to attend. Since it is difficult to keep an emergency room open in a rural area, I thought that a walk-in clinic after hours might help," she said.
The clinic currently employs one LPN, who is providing nursing and receptionist duties, but as time passes Stander hopes to hire a separate receptionist.
The clinic is open Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 9 a.m. to noon and 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. for appointments and from 2 to 4 p.m. for walk-ins. It will also provide walk-in services every second and fourth weekend on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon and on Monday and Thursday evenings from 6 to 9 p.m. It will be closed on holidays.
The clinic will offer services including complete medicals, children's check-ups, drivers' medicals, pre-op evaluations, pap smears and procedures including minor stitches and removal of moles or lesions. It is not an emergency room and will not be open for acute illnesses, heart attacks, active seizures, large lacerations and acute asthma attacks.
Cast application and removal and hospital admitting are not available through Stone-Cross. Stander will still be paid a fee for service by Saskatchewan Health and patients will only have to pay out of pocket for the same uninsured services they would pay for at other clinics such as skin tags, warts other than planters' warts and driver's medicals.
She chose Maidstone for her clinic and is seeing advantages of clinic ownership.
"I am deciding on my hours, my weekly patient load and the way I would like to serve patients," she said.
