OMSA Day of Action 2026: Wait times and timely access to care

TORONTO – The Ontario Medical Students Association (OMSA) will host its annual Provincial Day of Action (DoA) on March 22 and 23, 2026. This year’s DoA will focus on Wait Times and Timely Access to Care as its central theme and bring together medical students from all seven medical schools across the province to advocate for essential reforms in access to important health resources.

The OMSA DoA, held at Queen's Park in Toronto, provides a platform for students to engage directly with members of provincial parliament and discuss policy changes that address the urgent needs of our health-care system. 

A 2025 survey conducted by Ipsos on behalf of the Ontario Medical Association (OMA) found that 68 per cent of Ontarians said the health-care system had declined over the previous year and 83 per cent felt that wait times for surgeries, specialist appointments and diagnostic tests such as MRIs had worsened.  

This underscores a central challenge facing Canada’s publicly funded system: timely access to care has not kept pace with ever-increasing provincial demand.

For many patients, the defining experience of the healthcare system is prolonged waits for essential services – from securing a family physician to emergency department wait times, specialist consultations, and mental health support. This picture is further exacerbated in northern Ontario where patients experience significantly longer waits for both routine and urgent care, further widening regional inequities in timely access to care.

Addressing wait times requires coordinated, evidence-informed policy interventions that expand service capacity, stabilize the health-care workforce, and strengthen long-term training pipelines. OMSA proposes the following four asks to the provincial government: 

1. Build upon the existing Roadmap to Wellness Plan and embed harm reduction services within the current addictions care model (HART Hubs)
2. Ensure effective implementation of the centralized intake and referral system which includes successful adoption across primary care providers and specialists, transparency on progress metrics and long-term funding and support
3. Ensure robust funding for primary care teaching clinics and support their timely opening and sustainable operation by coordinating closely with Ontario's medical schools and working with physicians to design clinics that are attractive to preceptors
4. Ensure the prompt and effective operationalization of a rural coordinating centre for northern Ontario to stabilize the rural physician workforce in northern Ontario

These recommendations respond directly to the key drivers of prolonged wait times and represent essential steps toward a more equitable, efficient and timely health-care system for all Ontarians. By advocating for these changes, we aim to build a health system in Ontario that truly understands what preventative healthcare means for patients.

About the OMA 

The Ontario Medical Association represents Ontario’s 50,000-plus physicians, medical students and retired physicians, advocating for and supporting doctors while strengthening the leadership role of doctors in caring for patients. Our vision is to be the trusted voice in transforming Ontario’s health-care system.

For more information, please contact: 

OMA Media Relations
media@oma.org