Although the board and administration of Muskoka Algonquin Health Care (MAHC) continue to work on a restructuring plan that would see one centrally-located hospital replace the two existing hospitals in Muskoka, Huntsville Mayor Scott Aitchison is feeling more confident that an alternative plan being touted by area municipalities and healthcare providers will save the two-hospital model.
Still, MAHC is obligated to continue with its plan. “They’ve submitted the first phase of it and the Province has responded by saying ‘we need more information on a few different items’ and so they’re back to the drawing board,” said Huntsville Mayor Scott Aitchison.
The Mayor is part of a taskforce that was struck by the North Simcoe Muskoka Local Health Integration Network (LHIN), which co-ordinates and funds health care services in the area on behalf of the Ministry of Health, to find a consensus among stakeholders.
“In the meantime, our taskforce has been meeting and, in part because of the doctors of North Muskoka coming together and agreeing to primary care reform, the hospital board, the LHIN, the municipalities of Muskoka, East Parry Sound, and the District, and the medical community – at least in North Muskoka – are all very eager to come together to find a transformation of the way we deliver healthcare as opposed to trying to close both hospitals and trying to build one,” said Aitchison.
We were able to demonstrate that even if they close both hospitals in Huntsville and Bracebridge and build one in Port Sydney, we still wouldn’t be sustainable in the Province’s funding formula. We need to make some transformative change to the way we deliver it and save money that way.
Mayor Scott Aitchison
The taskforce, which includes the chair of the board of MAHC, got off to a rocky start, said Aitchison. “When we started these taskforce meetings they were hostile. Charlie Forret would just sit there and scowl at us. A couple of times he lashed out because he was so mad that (Bracebridge Mayor Graydon Smith) and I didn’t smarten up and just listen to him. And the last couple of meetings have been the most positive. It just feels they’re eager to be part of this change now. And so what’s happened in the last little while is we’ve got a smaller group meeting for the last month to put together the governance and the parameters and the scope, I guess, of a body or group that will actually lead the research and analysis and layout the plan for this transformative change in the way that we deliver healthcare.”
The taskforce is scheduled to meet again, Friday, May 20, to review the plan proposed by the subgroup and hopefully endorse it, said Aitchison. That plan is similar to a program by the name of Health Links, established to coordinate care for patients with complex needs. See more on the Province’s Community Health Links here.
“I call it Health Links on steroids. So Health Links is fairly specific, this would be much broader and part of the pitch to the Ministry of Health to be on board with us and help us with it and do it with us, will be that they’ve got to fund the acute care system fully for the next couple of years while we make this happen.”
We can’t be in constant crisis mode. So it if it means making sure that MAHC has $2 million extra for the next two years to help make sure we can keep facilities open, that’s what we want. We are confident that we can save enough money in that total healthcare spend in Muskoka to make both the sites viable.
Aitchison
Ultimately, whether the plan moves forward will depend on the support of the Minister and the various stakeholders. “In truth, probably the piece that has won us the ear of the Minister is the medical community in North Muskoka all saying that they will participate in primary care reform. This is a really important piece of public policy that the Minister sees as a personal legacy, I think. He really wants to see primary care reform happen.”
Aitchison said he believes that if Muskoka pulls it off, it can be a model for other areas that find themselves in a similar situation.
“A year ago February when Graydon Smith and I met with Minister Hoskins he said then that there were about five different hospitals in the province that were adversely affected by the funding formula… we were told in February past that it’s closer to 20 hospitals now that are facing the same kind of issue. It’s going to grow exponentially. How many towns are there the size of Huntsville in Ontario that have a little hospital and would just never be able to meet the funding formula? It’s going to grow.”
Aitchison said the fact that everyone is coming together to find a solution is boding well for this area. He anticipates that if the plan to transform healthcare in this community is approved, some of that change will involve a reduction of administration in the various health care organizations that serve this community.
The medical community has been saying for some time that before both the Bracebridge and Huntsville hospitals were amalgamated, the model that the Huntsville hospital worked on was much more cohesive, noted Aitchison.
He said in that model, the board of the Huntsville Hospital operated and owned the hospital. It also operated Fairvern Nursing Home, home care and long-term care access, and the ambulance service. “It was a very vertically integrated system where the hospital is in the middle of it… it was one administration that handled it all. Well, now there’s several administrations that run all those things. That might make sense in a place like the GTA where the volumes make sense and you need to have those administrations, but it doesn’t make sense here. We will never be sustainable in the Province’s funding formula through economies of scale, but we know we could do it through economies of scope.”
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I attended the North Simcoe Muskoka LHIN Task Force Meeting on May 20th, as an interested taxpayer, and this was my second. The first one was in March. That meeting saw consensus around the table by all Stakeholders to move forward with a smaller working group committee and a detailed plan to look at the whole healthcare system in Muskoka. My impression was that all Members agreed (NSM LHIN, MAHC, Medical, District Chair and Staff, Mayors and staff, and Councillor, at the table) to proceed with the draft structure and plans presented. This new Health System Transformation Leadership Council, (HSTL) is to be made up of 19 HSTL Council members. Now its to pick those Members from the “expression of interest” process. This structure, as the terms of reference will indicate is to encompass all Muskoka healthcare systems not just the acute. This is truly an exceptional next step, not only for Muskoka but potentially for other rural areas. The HSTL Council Members chosen will need to assess, analyse and make recommendations through a report that will have long term health care implications. My question is which process will be selected to choose the HSTL Council Members; will it be via the NSM LHIN, public advertisement, existing people involved or a hybrid mix of all? My preference would be the hybrid and my only caveat; choose wisely. I know this will be so.
When so much is dependent on getting the mix right today and for our future here is my RX; right leadership people+right analyses+right health systems+right recommendations+right implementation=best rural Muskoka health outcomes actualized for all!
Dear Mr. Milliman,
Thank you for your input. In response to your comments, the meetings are in fact public. ‘Sic’ is generally only used when a word quoted appears odd or wrong within the context or it is a word that does not really exist. I am not sure where you see the word “mad” twice. It is not, as you state, in the following sentence. As for putting Charles Forret’s title in parentheses, he is introduced leading into the quote. Although you are right, it certainly could have been clearer or spelled out for those unable to make the connection.
I do not know, nor is it particularly germane, whether the Taskforce meetings are open to the public. A committee member simply does not report on another member’s facial expression or his verbal outbursts. If, however, the meetings are closed, i.e. confidential, then such behaviour deserves censure. “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.”
Your reporter was also somewhat careless in her reportage. It is very important contextually that “Charlie” (Charles) Forret is Chair of the MAHC Board, and this should have been included parenthetically. Also, I believe that “sic” should have been appended to the word “mad” in the following sentence. Mindless repetition of improper vocabulary is poor journalism.
I totally believe in the 2 hospitals system, one for Huntsville & north & 1 for South Muskoka, for what its worth.