Greater Sudbury to be geriatrics hub for northeast

BY BILL BRADLEY

Greater Sudbury is getting its first geriatrics doctor.

Dr. Jo-Anne Clarke, a former Lively resident, will head up a seniors’ clinic starting in March at Pioneer Manor.

Her 4,000 sq. foot clinic will become a reality after receiving funding from the City of Greater Sudbury and the province. Her geriatrics program was supported at city council last week. She is completing her medical residency at the University of Waterloo in London.

“We want this clinic to be a regional model. We received part of the money from the province’s Aging At Home Strategy. Although we will be located at Pioneer Manor, where the specialized geriatrics care is, the goal is to provide leadership, collaboration and co-ordinated care for seniors with complex medical issues throughout northeastern Ontario,” said Clarke. The clinic will be one of only six in the province.

“We want our seniors to age at home,” she said. To do that there needs to be more education and co-ordination amongst service providers, she said.

The service includes comprehensive geriatrics care. This includes medical care, social care as well as being able to help seniors improve function and reducing their disabilities, she noted. Sudbury would act as a hub for all the northeast in geriatrics care.

Last Wednesday city council voted to hire Dr. Clarke after they supported recommendations from a report prepared by Kim Rossi, co-ordinator of health initiatives.

The city will share equally the $1 million costs associated with the creation of the clinic with the Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation.

“This means we will have a team of professionals to provide the care that is so desperately needed here and elsewhere. This is quite the event for our community,” said Ward 8 Coun. Ted Callaghan. He  spoke in favour of the hiring and has been a strong advocate of a geriatrics clinic. “It (the geriatrics program) is the result of much hard work by many, many people in our community,” he said.

Callaghan said the clinic would include two clinical nurses, a physiotherapist, an occupational therapist, a dietician, a social worker and a resource consultant.

The initiative would be part of a seniors' complex at Pioneer Manor. Other components include services for dementia and Alzheimer’s patients, as a well as a family health team. Elder abuse and mental services are also in place.

Clarke said the geriatrics initiative may help to bring more doctors into the community.

“We doctors like to bring our friends with us. There is (currently) only one geriatrics doctor in all of northeastern Ontario. I would love that there would be more. I do my best to bring whoever I can to the community.”

Though Dr. Clarke does not arrive until March 9, 2009 there is much to be done to build her team. “A geriatrician alone is no one. There will be nurses, social workers and others. We need these people to be trained in geriatrics. We have partnered with the regional geriatrics programs. They said, ‘hire your team and we will work with them over the next few months until you take over in March.’ ”

The funding is solid for at least the next three years, said Clarke. “There is a lot of provincial money available for geriatrics. The hope is that will be sustainable funding. It is so exciting.”