Health Governance

It’s been over 10 days since I last blogged – time to catch up a little.

On January 16, 2008 we held a very successful conference on Health Care Governance renewal that focussed on the changes being implemented in Ontario. Ontario is in the process of implementing a “made in Ontario” regional model that integrates health services by region under what are called Local Health Integration Networks or LHINs in acronym. The job of the LHIN is to integrate all health services in a given geographic region – home care, long-term care, hospitals, mental health, etc. Unlike BC or Alberta, the model in Ontario has meant the elimination of the local level of governance (health provider Boards). The model therefore includes local governance, a LHIN governance structure (there are 14 LHINS in Ontario) and the Ministry of Health and Long-term Care at the apex.

These changes in structure mean that there is a tremendous amount of transformation of the system that has to occur – changes in the management of the system; in the governance of the system; in the interaction between the players; in the way that the Ministry of Health interacts with the system; etc. A lot of change!! The conference brought together Board members and senior management from a wide variety of health care providers, LHINs, Community Care Access Centres, etc to talk about how to start changing governance and management to ensure the integration of the system and the strategic alignment of the system.

We have created a new section on the IPAC website that is dedicated to health care – by health care I mean the management and governance issues related to health care (not clinical issues!). We will be expanding this section over the next few years as we continue to work in helping ameliorate health care management and governance in Canada. Check out this new section – there are two ways to get there: Look under “Key Initiatives” or look for Health Care under the “Research” section of the website.