Was Virtual Care as Safe as In-Person Care? Analyzing Patient Outcomes at Seven and Thirty Days in Ontario during the COVID-19 Pandemic
In 2020, almost overnight, the paradigm for healthcare interactions changed in Ontario. To limit person-to-person transmission of COVID-19, the norm of in-person interactions shifted to virtual care. While this shift was part of broader public health measures and an acknowledgment of patient and societal concerns, it also represented a change in care modalities that had the potential to affect the quality of care provided, as well as short- and long-term patient outcomes. While public policy decisions were being made to moderate the use of virtual care at the end of the declared pandemic, a thorough analysis of short-term ...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
It Is Time for Health Quality 5.0: Are You Ready?
The work of health leaders is broadening in scope, scale and urgency to respond to massive global changes and challenges – including risks to safe, accessible and high-quality healthcare, threats to planetary health, crises in workforce resiliency and erosion of public trust and confidence. To address these issues and deliver on other imperatives around equity and inclusive service co-production, health leaders must again fashion a new quality improvement (QI) agenda fit for the times and the future, aligned with the move from digitization to personalization. The new era, Health Quality 5.0, must enable ...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Oshkibiimaates Wiidoogakewin: A Partnership between Matawa First Nations Management and St. Joseph’s Care Group
Many Indigenous young people who live in remote northern communities are required to relocate to larger urban centres to pursue their secondary education. These youth have often experienced significant hardships that are exacerbated by the stresses of relocation. When seeking help for these struggles, it can be complicated to navigate complex systems in an unfamiliar city and difficult to engage with services that may not be designed to address these unique needs. The question then becomes: what would happen if those specialized supports were easily accessible and provided in a space where the youth felt safe and valued? A...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
A Case Study Implementing a Social Needs Screening Process and a Family Navigation Hub at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital
Identifying and addressing clients' and families' most pressing social determinants of health needs are integral to quality healthcare. Healthcare leaders and front-line clinicians have long recognized the connection between unmet essential resource needs, such as food, housing and transportation and health outcomes. As a component of broader organizational efforts to improve equitable access to services, a social needs screening (SNS) initiative was introduced, along with a Family Navigation Hub providing navigation interventions. This paper describes the systematic approach taken to support the SNS initiative implementat...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Intergenerational Civics Programs to Combat Structural Ageism in Canada
Intergenerational civics programs that offer high school graduates a reduction in college or university admissions fees, or rental fees, can stimulate the formulation of a new wave of social impact initiatives. Provided that each program is accredited externally for quality, this approach could attenuate tensions between generations, diminish social isolation among seniors and help young people with housing and higher education affordability, both of which are provincial priorities. It could provide valuable assistance to the elderly in need while also fostering a sense of civic responsibility and community engagement amon...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
The Commonwealth Fund Survey of Primary Care Physicians Reveals Challenges Experienced by Family Doctors and Emphasizes the Need for Interoperability of Health Information Technologies
Electronic health information that is easily accessible and shareable among healthcare providers and their patients can provide substantial improvements in Canada's primary care system and population health outcomes. The Commonwealth Fund's (CMWF's) 2022 International Health Policy Survey of Primary Care Physicians (CIHI 2023) highlights the views and experiences of primary care doctors in 10 developed countries, including Canada. The survey covered various topics related to physician workload, the use of information technology and coordination of care. While the COVID-19 pandemic contributed to an increased physician work...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
The Importance of Race and Ethnicity Data on Cardiovascular Health Research
This article explores the importance of and current progress in collecting race and ethnic data in Canada and provides examples of its importance in cardiovascular health outcomes. We believe that a successful implementation of standardized data collection tools on race and ethnicity data will shape evidence-based policies to minimize health disparities in Canada in the future. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - October 31, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
From the Editors
(Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - August 2, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Ethics in Quality Improvement Projects: Experiences of a Human Factors Team
The Alberta Health Services Human Factors (HF) team completes many quality improvement projects involving human participants and requires a robust and efficient ethics process. The team has developed an ethics process utilizing ARECCI (A pRoject Ethics Community Consensus Initiative), wherein HF specialists review their project for alignment with a reference project. The reference project captures a broad range of work that the HF team may lead or support in some way, and it has a corresponding series of countermeasures that have been created to address ethical risks. While some challenges remain, the process has largely a...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
A Systems-Level Evaluation Framework for Virtual Care
The virtual care landscape is significantly changing, largely due to an increased demand initiated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the evolution of technology. Complex questions about how to best leverage virtual care and its impact remain unanswered. Our team developed a systems-level evaluation framework to inform virtual care service design and evaluation to take a more comprehensive approach to planning and implementing virtual care. We designed the framework for application in Alberta Health Services (AHS) by engaging virtual care users (patients, families and healthcare providers), implementation staff and decision make...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
A Clinical Consensus Approach to Developing a New Funding Model for Radiation Services in Ontario
In 2021, Ontario Health (Cancer Care Ontario) introduced a quality-based procedure model for the funding of radiation treatment (RT) in Ontario. This model ties reimbursement to patient care activities, ensuring equity and transparency in funding. Over 200 RT interprofessionals (oncologists, therapists and physicists) participated on 22 expert panels to establish or identify 288 evidence-based RT protocols and 672 quality expectations (QEs) to optimally deliver RT, which eventually led to the micro-costing of all protocols. Iterative review is required to ensure updated techniques and identify evolving standards of care, t...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Critical Success Factors of Street Haven’s Residential Addictions Treatment Program for Women
Street Haven's residential addictions treatment program offers a 90-day residential treatment program to highly vulnerable women who suffer from significant health and social care complexity, including homelessness, experience with gender-based violence, mental illness and chronic diseases. Despite the complexity of the needs of the clients, the program supports recovery, greater housing and enhanced overall well-being for the women it serves. The critical factors contributing to the success of the program include client readiness, pre-treatment programming, group-based programming, evidence-based programming, harm reducti...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Hospital Care for Patients Uninsured due to Immigration Status during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Toronto: Lessons from Front-Line Knowledge Translation
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, patients in Ontario who were uninsured due to immigration status faced barriers to hospital care that resulted in preventable illness and death. In March 2020, the Ontario Ministry of Health issued a memo indicating that it would pay for medically necessary hospital services for uninsured patients (Ontario Ministry of Health 2020). Front-line providers and research workers associated with the Health Network for Uninsured Clients (HNUC) set out to ensure that hospitals in Toronto implemented the ministry's memo. In this paper, we demonstrate a model of front-line worker–led knowledge ...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Creating Health Equity in Cancer Screening: Developing Outreach Strategies for Under-Screened Populations through Community Engagement
Inequities in cancer screening were identified in Calgary, AB, by correlating low screening participation with higher material deprivation. This initiative sought to understand awareness of and barriers to breast, cervical and colorectal cancer screening to inform the co-design and implementation of an outreach strategy to increase screening awareness. Online focus groups with community members (n = 69) identified five themes, and interviews with community health workers (n = 21) identified four themes. The engagement phase led to a multi-component outreach strategy including a multiling...
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
Improving Health Systems: There Is No App for That
Healthcare apps generally do not offer a coordinated strategy that aligns incentives among payers and patients, nor do apps solve underlying structural economic problems of sustainability, quality or equity. The economics of payers demand pilot testing; evidence-based research and iterative design; sustained communications to patients with the most need; and slow, careful integration that coordinates the needs of all participants. An integrated social systems app model can take the pressure off a stressed system. (Source: Healthcare Quarterly)
Source: Healthcare Quarterly - July 27, 2023 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Source Type: research
