Why are so many of Alberta's rural doctors from South Africa?

In January 2014, Dr. Cornelius Nortje arrived at the Edmonton International Airport, ready to start his new life in Alberta.

Nortje was met at the airport by the chief of staff at the Lac La Biche hospital. The chief of staff had two large down jackets, one for Nortje and one for his wife.

Nortje had never previously been in Canada. The day he and his wife landed, the chief of staff drove them 250 kilometres northeast to their new home town.

"We were probably just looking for a bit of an adventure," said Nortje, who is now in the chief-of-staff role himself at the William J. Cadzow–Lac La Biche Healthcare Centre.

"Most of the South African doctors know someone that's either been in Canada or was on their way to Canada, and the feedback we've always had from them once they've been here has been that it's absolutely fantastic," he said.

As the local physician in charge of recruitment, Nortje says he's never received an application from a Canadian-trained doctor.

Lac La Biche, a hamlet with a population of about 2,300, currently has five doctors, all of them from South Africa.

Overall in Alberta, 6.5 per cent of all practising physicians graduated medical school in South Africa, according to figures provided by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta.

Outside of Edmonton and Calgary, 13 per cent of Alberta doctors trained in South Africa, the CPSA said. In the North zone of Alberta Health Services, South African-trained doctors represent one-third of all rural physicians.

Across the province, the CPSA website lists more doctors who speak Afrikaans, the Dutch-derived colonial language in South Africa, than those who speak Mandarin, Cantonese, Tagalog, Punjabi, Hindi or Ukrainian.

Amid ongoing physician shortages, the provincial government last month announced it will provide some funding to train more rural doctors.

The CPSA has also responded to the pressure. It launched a pilot to remove some barriers for international doctors from approved jurisdictions to start practising in the province. 

Since the 1970s, South African doctors have been one of the largest demographics answering the call in Western Canada's rural communities.

South African doctors' experience at home prepares them for rural medicine in Canada, Nortje said.