Better health care could be on the way for Bradford residents.
Based on a report from town chief administrative officer Geoff McKnight, and following a presentation from Paul Woods, doctor, president and chief executive officer for Newmarket's Southlake Regional Health Centre, as well as Christina Bisanz, co-chair of the Northern York South Simcoe Ontario Health Team, council voted to approve a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Southlake and the health team, during its Oct. 15 regular meeting.
Deputy Mayor Raj Sandhu noted the agreement might only be the first step to improving care, but it is still “the right step.”
“This MOU is very much needed, and I know something good will come out of this,” he said.
While non-binding, the MOU is intended to formalize a commitment to improving health facilities and resources within town, as part of Southlake’s distributed model of care, which aims to offer additional health-care services closer to home across the communities the hospital serves through expanded programs and new facilities, according to the report.
Ward 2 Coun. Jonathan Scott likened that to the philosophy he recently read in former federal health minister Jane Philpott’s book Health for All.
“Every citizen should have access to a primary-care team the same way that every student has access to a neighbourhood public school,” he said.
Scott also shared some of his own recent experience being admitted to the hospital last month.
“Your staff, from the caterer to the doctors and especially the nurses, are astounding,” he said.
Mayor James Leduc said council was looking forward to getting the MOU signed that very evening.
“We have the best hospital in Ontario right here in our backyard,” he said. “We are so proud of what they do there.”
Other improvements could include new and expanded health and wellness services, advocacy, data sharing, exploring research and innovation, fostering collaboration and capacity building.
“It isn’t just a matter of more programs or more clinics. It’s really about an integrated system of care that works seamlessly between providers,” Woods said, noting that health needs can vary significantly from one community to the next.
“This is about customized health care for the people that you serve and that we serve collectively,” he said.
Specific objectives of the MOU include:
- increasing health-care capacity by developing facilities and resources in town, while also expanding use of existing spaces
- attracting new health-care services, including new primary care clinics and practitioners
- better integration of seniors’ health care among local retirement homes, long-term care homes, local primary-care practitioners, and Southlake
- representing the town’s diverse population and associated health and wellness needs
- advocating for uniform data-sharing platforms among health-care providers to reduce administrative burdens
According to the report, the MOU is based on a similar agreement with Georgina, but tailored to Bradford based on a public meeting on May 14, and is expected to help council meet one of its strategic priorities of enhanced health care in the community.
Woods emphasized that the feedback from that public meeting favoured more local options.
“People didn’t want bigger hospitals with bigger two-storey windows — they wanted better care closer to home, and that’s really what this is all about,” he said.
To illustrate a few examples, Bisanz pointed to a few existing partnerships, some of which included:
- Collaboration between Southlake and The Elden to transition alternative level of care patients out of hospital sooner
- Southlake’s Cardiac Rehabilitation Team running a wellness clinic out of the leisure centre every Tuesday
- Southlake’s Academic Family Health Team running daytime clinics and an off-hours urgent care centre in the Family Health Centre at 100 Holland Court six days a week
While there is no direct financial impact to the agreement, McKnight notes that all parties entering the MOU acknowledge that additional investment is required to provide better local access to health-care services and facilities.
Council voted unanimously in support of endorsing the MOU, though Ward 3 Coun. Ben Verkaik was absent.
