The Ontario College of Family Physicians predicts the province's health care system will "collapse" by 2020 if more residents don't get access to "family health care teams."

In a new report called "Vision 2020: Raising the Bar in Family Medicine and Ontario's Primary Care Sector," the doctors group says not only does every Ontarian need a family doctor, that doctor needs to be part of a multi-disciplinary care team.

About 94 per cent of Ontario residents have access to a family physician, according to the Ontario Ministry of Health, but only a fraction have access to doctors who work in team-based practices. The College notes that with more and more patients dealing with multiple medical conditions, only a family health team can effectively manage all of a patient's health care needs.

These teams combine the expertise of doctors and nurses along with dietitians, mental health workers, social workers, and pharmacists.

The doctors group also released the results of a survey it commissioned from Harris-Decima that shows that 30 per cent of Ontario's population over the age of 18 suffers from a chronic illness. That's about 2.8 million Ontarians. As well, 13 per cent suffer from two or more conditions.

The doctors note that the chronic illnesses are typically incurable, often get worse over time, and typically require ongoing care. They include heart disease, diabetes, arthritis, lung diseases and mental health conditions.

Patients need the ongoing care that a multi-disciplinary team of health care professionals provides to prevent and manage these conditions, says College President Dr. Anne DuVall.

"One of the greatest health challenges facing Ontario in the 21st century is the need to develop effective approaches to prevent chronic and other illnesses in the first place, and to address the increasing number of people developing and living with these conditions," she said in a news release.

"If we do not make the right investments in the primary care sector now, hospitals will crash under the growing weight of chronic and other diseases."

The college says that by 2012, 3.2 million Ontarians will be enrolled in the 200 family health teams and other models that provide comprehensive multi-disciplinary care. But that still leaves close to 10 million Ontarians without access to the kind of treatment provided in team-based practices.

"We've made some good progress over the past 10 years by offering family health teams to some Ontarians, but the time has come to kick these initiatives into high gear," DuVall said.

"The province needs to continue to invest in the primary care sector until every person in the province is rostered with a family physician that is supported by an inter-professional team."