After about a year of planning, Sarnia-Lambton's Ontario Health Team has been approved by the province.
Health Minister Christine Elliott announced Wednesday that the government is spending $2.4 million to create 13 new health teams across Ontario, including in Sarnia-Lambton.
Bluewater Health is one of more than 35 local health and social service organizations involved in the initiative that will remove barriers for those accessing healthcare.
Hospital CEO Mike Lapaine said during its first year, the team will focus on transforming care for seniors, and advancing mental health and addiction services for ages 12 to 25.
"When we're fully formed, we will encompass 100 per cent of the population," said Lapaine. "The idea is in the first year, you look at how to deliver care differently for a specific group, and you get everyone working on that specific focus. You then take the learnings from that and apply it to another group so you eventually ripple it out. Eventually, you've changed how people access care for really 100 per cent of the population."
Lapaine said the coordinated approach will make it easier to access services, provide the community with increased quality care, and create a seamless transition between healthcare providers.
"There's many different sectors like acute care, long-term care, primary care, home care, and mental health and addictions," he said. "Patients frequently travel between all of those sectors, and they should feel like it's just one system regardless of what their access point is. I think, in the past, too frequently it's felt like they've moved to a completely different agency. What we're trying to do is make that easy for them."
Lapaine said, ironically, a lot of the work they still need to do is already ongoing during the pandemic.
"Much of it is how to change relationships and strengthen connections between the various agencies and sectors in healthcare. In an interesting way, COVID has actually helped us progress in that area. We've had to work with all of our different partners in different ways. I think that's really enhanced the relationships and connections that we have between agencies."
The creation of regional health teams across the province was announced after the Progressive Conservative party declared plans to disband Ontario’s 14 Local Health Integration Networks.
Ontario Health Teams are geared to serve groups of 50,000 to 300,000 people and will be accountable for service delivery and system performance in their respective areas.