Ontario's Community Care Access Centres' Three Recommendations to Improve our Health Care System

TORONTO, Feb. 13, 2012 /CNW/ - Ontario's Community Care Access Centres (CCACs) today released a new paper that identifies three specific and strategic opportunities that, if acted upon, will help accelerate Ontario's Action Plan for Health Care towards value-based, outcome-oriented health care in Ontario.  The Action Plan was first announced on January 30, 2012 by Ontario Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, Deb Matthews.

The CCACs' new paper entitled, Accelerating Ontario's Action Plan for Health Care, is a commitment to Ontario to support the positive transformation of the health care system. True health system integration arises from the care needs of individuals and the functions of the various players who consider how collaboratively working together will achieve optimal health system goals. Following this approach, CCACs are driven to improve quality of care throughout the system.

The CCACs' three recommendations for functional reform keep the needs of clients and a healthier population for Ontario top of mind. Here is how CCACs can help make healthy change happen in Ontario:

1. Integrate family health care into the Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs) through a robust care coordination model
2. Focus on the complex needs of an aging population through cross-system intensive case-management
3. Drive quality and accountability through innovative patient-based funding models

"CCACs are already contributing to moving the Action Plan ahead by working with primary care providers to provide proactive integrated service delivery," says Margaret Mottershead, CEO, Ontario Association for Community Care Access Centres (OACCAC).  "We agree with the integration of family health care into the LHINs and are eager to play a role, as care coordinators, in shaping and supporting a model that brings planning and accountability for the full patient journey under the LHINs."

Committed to supporting and strengthening functional integration alongside health system partners, CCAC are working closely with the LHINs in order to deliver truly patient-centred care.  CCACs are uniquely positioned to weave the system together so that we successfully wrap care around the most vulnerable members of our aging population. Leveraging the CCACs' work with complex seniors and building on it to address admission and readmission of seniors to the hospital can begin to drive Ontario's Senior Strategy.

Finally, as more procedures are moved into the community and more people are receiving care at home instead of in the hospital or long-term care, functional reform becomes an essential component for outcome-oriented patient-based funding that will ensure better patient care and better value from our health care dollars.

"Investing in home and community care is key to the vision of right care in the right place at the right cost and the Action Plan becoming a reality," added Mottershead. "We must keep in mind that time is short to make a difference. We must act now."

View the full summary of the recommendations in Accelerating Ontario's Action Plan for Health Care

About Community Care Access Centres (CCACs):
CCACs provide services in the home and the community for over 600,000 Ontarians annually. They give Ontarians a single point of access and connection to the most appropriate health care services to meet their individual needs, ensuring the right care in the right place at the right time.

About the Ontario Association of Community Care Access Centres (OACCAC):
The OACCAC serves as the collective voice for the contribution made by Ontario's CCACs - key players within a sustainable integrated health care system. The OACCAC fosters strategic alliances within the health care system while continuously delivering high quality shared services to members and health care partners.

Gabriella Skubincan
Director, Communications & Marketing
Ontario Association of Community Care Access Centres
416.640.4803
gabriella.skubincan@ccac-ont.ca