Retired but not expired

“Emeritus, in its current usage, is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor or other person who has been permitted to retain as honorary title the rank of the last office held.” Wikipedia neglected to include doctors! I retired from my solo GP medical practice on September 30, 2020. It was a 49-year run. On April 16, 2021, with some trepidation, I notified the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario of my decision to resign my membership, just shy of 50 years, and provided a “cease to practice undertaking,” duly signed and dated. This was acknowledged and processed the same day. In my conversation with the Coordinator of Registration and Membership Services, I was asked if I would entertain emeritus status as a continuum to my long career. I liked the sound of this esteemed designation. The formal application stipulates that I “have fully retired from the practice of medicine, both in Ontario and elsewhere, and I hereby request emeritus status with the CPSO.” A number of additional bullet point conditions are listed on the formal application, including but not limited to, “I am not currently the subject of proceedings for professional misconduct or incompetence.” I am reminded of Richard Nixon’s “I am not a crook” speech. The emeritus application was completed and submitted on April 19, 2021. On a recent, somewhat dreary winter’s afternoon, I was reviewing some of my old blogs, one of which referenced the College. And then I suddenly realized that since the beginning of 2021, I had not received any email or other communications from the CPSO, and that included Dialogue, “a publication for Ontario Doctors.” I would have expected that with formal “emeritus status” in this august (“inspiring reverence or admiration; of supreme dignity or grandeur”) regulatory body, I should still be on their electronic and conventional mailing lists. The quarterly provides regular updates on the machinations of a College which not only guides the profession, but also disciplines it. Was the CPSO “running silent” or was my status modified from emeritus to persona non grata without my knowledge or consent? Read Dr. Goldstein on: A scalp in room 11 I have always kept impeccable and voluminous records. I have copious files folders and manila envelopes clearly labelled and readily accessible. Who needs the Cloud anyways? I found my correspondence with the CPSO which confirmed that I had duly dotted and crossed all the articles of resignation. I then went to the member portal of the CPSO. It declined access, it didn’t even recognize me. I haven’t changed that much in eight months. Maybe just a few extra pounds. I started with “doctor search,” entered my last name and CPSO # and was surprised when I read “no matches found.” I repeated the exercise with the same disappointing result. Then I saw “switch to advanced search” and then checked the “search doctor no longer registered with the CPSO” box. I entered my data somewhat hesitantly. I didn’t want to learn that “no longer registered” implied a more terminal fate. The page opened up and the first thing I saw was “expired”! I immediately checked my pulse. Once I recovered from the shock of this misleading and preposterous clinical opinion, I realized that this was most assuredly in reference to my membership status. But would my patients interpret this literally, triggering an unintended grieving process while searching for guidance in locating their health records? Nowhere was the word “emeritus” in evidence! I took a deep breath and called the College membership services and after a brief musical interlude of questionable taste, was connected with an advisor working from the comforts of his home office. I informed him of my College conundrum, specifically the details of my formal and fully-documented exit from practice, the emeritus application, the subsequent failure of the College to register this information in the Membership Services portal, and, the insulting rendering of my status as “expired.”.“Rumours of my demise are greatly exaggerated.” I embellished my displeasure further by informing him that I had been a 50-year member of the College, in relatively good standing, and had served 25 of those years in a number of official College endeavours including peer assessor, quality assurance review panel member, investigations and resolutions inspector, practice mentor and supervisor, and independent contractor. My standing had effectively been expunged, redacted, relegated to a single and unfortunate descriptive, “expired.” Read Dr. Goldstein on: The Report Card There was no immediate explanation for this glaring oversight. The advisor politely asked if I would hold while he conferred with a colleague, also functioning in the virtual ethers. I held in silence, at one point convinced that he had cancelled me. I couldn’t possibly go through this again. He resurfaced and thanked me for waiting, like I had a choice. All the subject documentation I provided the College had been received, 8 months earlier, and had been secured in my file. For some reason, defying any reasonable explanation, the emeritus application had never been processed. Oops! A flurry of apologies followed. He was not responsible for this FUBAR situation and I told him so. He responded by saying that he was apologizing on behalf of the College. Now that’s not something you hear every day. And then with a click, I was “emeritus.” The record has now been corrected for all to see. I am comforted in that it is only my licence to practice that has expired. My wife is also the beneficiary, of this knowledge. I am anticipating a deluge of College-generated emails in the weeks ahead and can’t wait for the latest volume of Dialogue to be delivered to my roadside mailbox. In retirement, College connectivity allows me to maintain my medical identity, a vital link with the past 50 years as a physician and the proverbial finger on the pulse of the medical profession, especially now that I have been confirmed as having one of my own. READ Dr. Goldstein on: There’s a hole in the bucket list

Piece of Mind

Retired but not expired

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Blog Author

HOWARD GOLDSTEIN

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