Reviewing the Evidence on Prenatal Opioid Exposure to Inform Child Development Policy and Practice
We present the epidemiology of prenatal opioid exposure in Ontario, summarize research examining child health outcomes with a focus on child development, review emerging guidelines for child health and developmental surveillance and highlight promising programs. We emphasize the need to strengthen current Canadian recommendations for routine enhanced developmental and vision screening and ensure funding for evidence-based integrated maternal/child services. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 20, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
A Note from the Publisher
(Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 19, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
The Relationship between Value-Based Care, Workforce Engagement and Clinical Leadership: Learning from an Outpatient Physiotherapy Team
Safety, quality and patient experience are the three key elements of a value-based patient-centred care model. The essential element that brings these together is workforce engagement. This case study illustrates how an outpatient physiotherapy team at a teaching hospital has adapted, evolved and enhanced new practices initiated at the clinician level. Organizations that provide front-line professionals with the tools and frameworks to evolve show value for their people and instill clinical leadership principles with implications for the success of continuous quality improvement initiatives. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Utilizing the Failure Mode and Effects Analysis Tool to Assess and Address Risks Associated with Transitions in Care
There is added risk each time a patient is transferred between healthcare sites or organizations (Anthony et al. 2005; Freitag and Carroll 2011; Manser et al. 2010; Sorrentino 2016). At our multi-site organization, such transfers are common, most often occurring for the purpose of access to diagnostic services. We sought to better understand the origins of those risks, prioritize them and establish relevant changes to processes and procedures to reduce such risks through the use of a failure mode and effects analysis (FMEA). We engaged with 50 stakeholders during the FMEA and used our organizational process improvement str...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Helping Families Thrive: Co-Designing a Program to Support Parents of Children with Medical Complexity
Families of children with medical complexity (CMC) face significant challenges beyond those related to caring for their child's medical condition. Parents of CMC report a variety of concerns impacting their social, emotional and financial well-being. This paper details how CHEO, community organizations and parents co-designed and evaluated the Navigator Program. Through system navigation, peer support and knowledge navigation, the program offers emotional, social and economic support for parents struggling to keep up with the demands of having CMC. A best practices toolkit also provides resources to help others better supp...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Mental Health Clinician Leaders in “Lockstep” as a Necessary Means to Address Care Challenges during the Pandemic
Clinical environments that provide mental health and addictions care have been challenged during the COVID-19 pandemic due to health human resource shortages. This paper provides some insights gleaned from nurse and physician leaders working together during the pandemic in the mental health context to tackle some of these challenges. Key takeaways are provided. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Do Not Waste a Crisis: Physician Engagement during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Physician engagement is an important factor in improving care quality and patient safety, but engaging physicians is not easy. Winston Churchill's famous assertion about never wasting a crisis has defined the approach taken by many leaders during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper describes three case studies of successful physician engagement across the continuum of acute care, chronic care and primary care settings during the pandemic. These examples offer insights on physician engagement within unique settings by leveraging intrinsic motivators and Spurgeon's model of medical engagement. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Health Professional Redeployment and Cross-Training in Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic
The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020 required hospitals to respond quickly and effectively to ensure the availability of healthcare professionals to care for patients. The Ottawa Hospital in Ottawa, ON, used a five-step process to ensure organizational readiness for redeployment of regulated health professionals as and when necessary: (1) define current scopes of practice; (2) obtain discipline-specific input; (3) develop strategies based on literature review and government dictates; (4) identify potential duties; and (5) ensure support for staff. With hospital management support, this plan was readily implemen...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
COVID-19, Workforce Autonomy and the Health Supply Chain
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the rapid surge in demand for critical supplies and public health efforts needed to guard against virus transmission have placed enormous pressure on health systems worldwide. These pressures and the uncertainty they have created have impacted the health workforce in a substantial way. This paper examines the relationship between health supply chain capacity and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Canada's health workforce. The findings of this research also highlight the impact of the pandemic on health workers, specifically the relationship between the health supply chain and the autonomy...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on Health System Use in Canada
The Canadian Institute for Health Information has compiled health system data to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Canada's healthcare system. Information was aggregated from four distinct sectors of care: emergency department visits, in-patient hospital stays, physician care and home care. Across the sectors, there were two compelling themes: rapid transformation and change in human behaviour. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
The Role of a Resilient Information Infrastructure in COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake in Ontario
The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for a robust and nimble public health data infrastructure. ICES – a government-sponsored, independent, non-profit research institute in Ontario, Canada – functions as a key component of a resilient information infrastructure and an enabler of data co-production, contributing to Ontario's response to the COVID-19 pandemic as part of a learning health system. Linked data on the cumulative incidence of infection and vaccination at the neighbourhood level revealed disparate uptake between areas with low versus high risk of COVID-19. These data were leveraged by...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
From the Editors
(Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 14, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
“This Is ME”: Promoting Person-Centred Care within the Digital Health Environment
In this paper, we describe the implementation of an initiative called "This Is ME," which involves a change in the summary page of a patient's electronic health record in order to include their story and provide a more humanistic perspective. The change includes information related to their family, hobbies and interests – a change that has important implications for facilitating conversation and relationship-building between providers and patients. Since implementation, 1,246 (and counting) patient stories were shared with over 300 healthcare providers, including nurses, social workers, physicia...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - April 15, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Implementing Advance Care Planning Tools in Practice: A Modified World Café to Elicit Barriers and Recommendations from Potential Adopters
This paper reports findings from a modified World Café conducted at a palliative care professional conference in 2019, where input on tools to support advance care planning (ACP) was solicited from healthcare practitioners, managers and family members of patients. Barriers to ACP tool use included insufficient structures and resources in healthcare, death-avoidance culture and inadequate patient and family member engagement. Recommendations for tool use included clarification of roles and processes, training, mandates and monitoring, leadership support, greater reflection of diversity in tools and methods for pu...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - April 15, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Implementation of the Good Life with OsteoArthritis in Denmark (GLA:D) Program across Canada for the Management of Hip and Knee Osteoarthritis
Good Life with osteoArthritis in Denmark (GLA:D®) is a program for the management of patients with hip and knee osteoarthritis (OA). Adapted for the Canadian population, the GLA:DTM Canada program implements evidence-based strategies to support the prevention, early diagnosis and effective management of hip and knee OA. GLA:D assists local communities in implementing OA strategies across the spectrum of disease severity. An integral part of this program is a national quality and outcomes registry, which includes data concerning participant characteristics and both patient-reported and functional outcomes. This regi...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - April 15, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
