October 7, 2016 — Yesterday, the Boards of Directors of Lakeridge Health, Rouge Valley Health System, and The Scarborough Hospital reviewed and voted on the integration of Rouge Valley’s Ajax and Pickering site with Lakeridge Health and the amalgamation of Rouge Valley’s Centenary site with The Scarborough Hospital to form a new hospital corporation. At their respective meetings, each of the Boards of Directors affirmed their support for these historic changes and voted to proceed with the integrations.
Each of the three Boards decided that the integrations would help improve the delivery of high quality care — creating hospital systems with a truly regional focus in both Scarborough and Durham.
“Having unified systems – one for Scarborough and one for Durham – will benefit our communities immensely,” said The Scarborough Hospital Board Chair Janet Dalicandro. “We will provide better and more equitable access to care and it will be easier for patients to navigate and access a broader range of high quality services right in their own community.”
In preparing for this important decision, the hospitals gathered input from staff and physicians, other health service providers, and the community through a variety of stakeholder engagement initiatives, including a robust, interactive website – Our Hospitals website.
“We have worked hard over the past several months to take every opportunity to listen to our families and our partners about delivering care,” said Lakeridge Health Board Chair Valentine Lovekin. “We’re seeing a real sense of excitement in our communities about the opportunities ahead of us — not only to integrate services but to build new acute care capacity. A chance like this comes along only once in a generation.”
The three Boards acknowledged the commitment from Minister of Health and Long-Term Care Eric Hoskins, who established the Scarborough-West Durham Expert Panel. The panel’s recommendations will help the hospitals in Scarborough and Durham work together to deliver better integrated care for their communities and to address infrastructure requirements. The recommendations also included the construction of new hospitals in Scarborough and Durham.
“This is an opportunity to improve the delivery of high quality care in Scarborough and Durham,” said Rouge Valley Health System Board Chair Fred Clifford. “We thank our communities, our Board members, physicians, staff, political leaders, and all health care partners for working with us on this.”
Next Steps
The next steps in the integration include:
Approval of amalgamation from the members of Rouge Valley Health System and The Scarborough Hospital.
Approval from the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care.
Boards of Directors
The first Board of Directors of the newly merged hospital in Scarborough has been established. The Board is made up of one third of Directors selected from each predecessor hospital (Rouge Valley Health System and The Scarborough Hospital) and one third as new Directors selected from the broader community. For more details on this new Board of Directors, see the accompanying backgrounder.
Three of the current Board members from Rouge Valley’s Ajax and Pickering site have been named to the Lakeridge Health Board of Directors. For more details on the Lakeridge Health Board of Directors, also see the accompanying backgrounder.
Temporary, Legal Name
The temporary, legal name of the new Scarborough hospital corporation is Scarborough and Rouge Hospital. Selection of a new, permanent name will be made following the amalgamation.
Both Lakeridge Health and Scarborough and Rouge Hospital will continue with planning and engagement activities involving all stakeholders as we move to build this exciting future of health care in our communities.
Media Contacts:
Lloyd Rang
Senior Director, Communications
Lakeridge Health
905-576-8711, ext. 4360
lrang@lakeridgehealth.on.ca
www.lakeridgehealth.on.ca
Leigh Duncan
Director of Government Relations and Communications
Rouge Valley Health System
416-284-8131, ext. 4010
leduncan@rougevalley.ca
www.rougevalley.ca
Holly-Ann Campbell
Director, Communications and Engagement
The Scarborough Hospital
416-438-2911, ext. 8308
hocampbell@tsh.to
www.tsh.to
