South West LHIN Health System Blueprint Project

UPDATE 12:  Refined Models of Care  

UPDATE 11: Panels from IHSP/Blueprint Public Engagement Sessions

UPDATE 10:  Health System Trends:  click here 

UPDATE 9:  Updates to Question and Answer document:  click here

UPDATE 8:  Integrated Health Services Plan and Blueprint Project - Update 2: 
click here

UPDATE 7:  Integrated Health Services Plan and Blueprint Project - Update 1: 
click here 

UPDATE 6: Public Engagement Sessions:  click here 

UPDATE 5: Emergency Department Human Resources Study - Final Report 

UPDATE 4: WEBCAST - "Managing Change, Transforming Health Care."  
Click here for the Powerpoint and click here to watch the Webcast

UPDATE 3: The membership of the Health System Design Steering Committee overseeing the project is listed here 

UPDATE 2: Question and Answer document: webpage or pdf 

UPDATE 1: Project timeline (pdf) 

About the Blueprint Project

The South West Local Health Integration Network is embarking on a project aimed at meeting today’s challenges in health care and creating a healthier tomorrow.

Over the coming months, this LHIN-sponsored project will bring health care providers, communities and residents together to develop a Health Services Blueprint.  The Blueprint will provide direction about how services can best be organized and delivered across the LHIN to meet the future health care needs of all communities and residents and ensure a system that is sustainable into the future.

The Blueprint will gather information on our present population, how they use the health care system and how well the present system meets their needs.  Information will also be gathered to determine how the needs of residents will change in the future and how health services will need to change to meet those needs.

Some key points:

• While our health system today ranks among the best in the world, it is facing significant challenges
• The Blueprint project is about improving health care to serve people better
• It will help ensure that the system of health services across our LHIN is organized, aligned and designed to provide the residents we serve with quality health services – when they need them and where they need them, today and tomorrow
• The Blueprint project will bring all care providers together to work on critical common issues – such as Health Human Resource challenges, reducing wait times for critical services, and keeping the health care system sustainable into the future

The Blueprint will form a core component for a renewed South West LHIN Integrated Health Service Plan, which is being developed at the same time.

A Health System Design Steering Committee composed of leaders from health care providers and the LHIN has been established to guide the development of the Blueprint.  As well, the South West LHIN has engaged the management consulting firm Deloitte to assist the in the planning, development and completion of a detailed current state assessment and the Blueprint framework.

In early March, work began to contact health care providers and other sources to gather credible data on the population of the LHIN, the use of health services, gaps between health care needs and the health services available to meet those needs, and innovative practices and models of care in use across the South West.  In early June, health care leaders and professionals from across the LHIN will be invited to attend symposiums to participate in developing and providing feedback on the Blueprint.

Extensive consultations with care providers and other key stakeholders across the LHIN are also planned throughout the project.  Among others, this will include individuals providing care within our communities, the residents of the South West LHIN, municipal governments, aboriginal and francophone communities.  A series of public forums will be held in communities across the South West, with initial meetings planned in July and a second round scheduled for September after summer holidays.

A completed Health Services Blueprint Report and South West LHIN Integrated Health Service Plan will be presented to the South West LHIN Board for approval in late October.

Once approved, these documents will be released publicly and shared with the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care by November 30 2009.

Further information will be posted here as the project develops.