Read about LHINs
at the Ministry of Health and Long-term Care website.
Editorial Give LHINs benefit of doubt as Province turns
to community Local Health Integration Networks
(LHINs) are hardly front page anews in the major media.
Yet from a community health perspective, perhaps they
should be.
The Province has placed significant focus
on the health care sector in general, infusing it with
new money, insisting hospitals challenge some of their
assumptions and to find new cost reductions, and creating
new standards in long-term care.
Not everything has been a slam-dunk for
this government, but the tone and approach has not been
half-hearted.. This government asked us to choose change,
and we did. It would seem the Province is attempting
to make good on its rhetoric.
LHINs are part of a major change package
for health care. They will integrate health services
but not by providing clinical services. Instead, LHINs
are expected to co-ordinate service delivery. This means
existing provider organizations will continue to be
relied upon to deliver services.
According to the provincial government,
LHINs will enhance and support local capacity to plan,
co-ordinate, integrate and fund the delivery of health
services at the community level. It isn’t yet
known if LHINs will encompass community access centres
or if access centres will remain outside of the LHINs
model. Either way, as access centres have told us, it’s
the client’s perspective that matters most.
That’s really the bottom line, isn’t
it? Choose a path that is person-centred and community-based
and you have the ingredients for success. Add in a healthy
dose of political will and we may soon have a system
changed for the better.. It may be that this time, the
system will have more to do with ‘community’
than it has in a long time.
If every community partner has a
voice and plays a meaningful role, this system might
just work.
If you are
interested in becoming
a member of our family as a resident, an employee
or a volunteer please contact us!
OMNI
must be part of talks about health care reform: CEO Dec. 10, 2004 - Roderick Benns OMNI's CEO, Fraser Wilson, says a recent community
workshop held to identify issues that will lead to Local
Health Integration Networks (LHINs) was wonderfully
collaborative, not territorial. More
Kay
says good consensus from LHINs stakeholders at community
workshop Dec. 7, 2004 - Roderick Benns A recent ‘community workshop’ held
to identify community-based issues that will lead to
new Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs) was recently
held in Markham. More
Access
Centre ED says LHINs a ‘sensible’ solution Oct. 25, 2004 - Roderick Benns
Local Health Integration Networks, or LHINs, being planned
in Ontario are something to be pleased about, according
to the executive director of the Haliburton, Northumberland
and Victoria Access Centre, Fran O’Hara. More
