Posted on Thursday October 27, 2016
October 26, 2016 — The integration of the Ajax-Pickering site of the Rouge Valley Health System with Lakeridge Health means better, more coordinated care for Durham families.
On Friday October 14, the Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, Eric Hoskins, issued a notice that he intends to direct the integration. This started a 30-day "notice period," during which time people in Durham can make submissions directly to the Minister about the integration or give input through the Our Hospitals website.
"The people of Ajax-Pickering have every reason to be proud of their hospital, and we’re very excited about this new partnership," said Interim Lakeridge Health President and CEO Tom McHugh. "And we want people to know that whatever services are in Ajax-Pickering now will be there a month from now. The bottom line is if your kids were born in Ajax, your grandkids will be born in Ajax."
"In fact," said McHugh, "We’re looking at ways we can add even more services — and we’ll have more to say about that in the weeks ahead."
The integration follows the findings of the Scarborough West-Durham Panel Report, which, among other things, recommended creating two new acute-care hospitals — one in Scarborough and one in Durham. The Ontario government has announced a $5 million planning grant to develop a Master Plan for each of the Scarborough and Durham region hospitals. This will inform any future major capital redevelopments.
For people in Durham, having a hospital system that spans the entire Region means:
- Creating critical mass, which will be magnet for attracting top talent to an expanded Lakeridge Health
- Tapping into Lakeridge Health’s growing role as a research-focussed, education-centred community hospital with strong academic partnerships with U of T, Queen’s and UOIT
- Joining Ajax-Pickering with a hospital that is on a strong financial footing, which helps drive up overall quality of care
- Investing one-time integration costs in a new clinical information system to better integrate care within the new Lakeridge Health
- Making it easier to add new services and work with other health care providers and services who operate across the Region
"This direction given by the Minister gives us more certainty and a bit more time to make sure we carry out our plan to integrate with our new partner as effectively as possible," said McHugh. "In the next few days we’ll be announcing telephone town halls, which give people another way to discuss the integration and what services we want to see in the new Lakeridge Health in the future. So stay tuned."
Quick Facts
- Lakeridge Health has been accredited with exemplary standing with a score of 99.4 per cent. Exemplary standing is given to organizations that go above and beyond the requirements of Accreditation Canada.
- The hospital’s stroke services achieved Stroke Distinction, Accreditation Canada’s highest rating for stroke care.
- The Institute for Quality Management in Healthcare has awarded Lakeridge Health’s laboratory top marks (99.6%).
- Lakeridge Health has been named one of the GTA’s Top 100 Employers for the last two years.
