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'Worst is behind us' HSN board chair says as hospital unveils new strategic plan

Hospital reveals its guiding principals for the next five years even as it prepares roll out its capital plan in the spring, which will cover future expansion plans
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Health Sciences North and HSNRI launched their 2019-2024 strategic plan on Feb. 5. (L to R) Julie-Anne Bergeron, patient and family advisor; Nicole Everest, HSN board chair; Maureen McLelland, Special Advisor to the CEO of HSN and HSNRI for Strategic Planning; Russell Landry, manager of in-centre nephrology; Dominic Giroux, HSN and HSRNI president and CEO. (Matt Durnan/Sudbury.com)

Health Sciences North and Health Sciences North Research Institute launched their 2019-2024 strategic plan on Feb. 5.

This plan will serve as a guide for the hospital and its research institute over the next five years, outlining five key goals and 19 key outcomes to be achieved by 2024.

HSN outlined five "key goals" in the strategic plan:

  • Be Patient and Family-Focused
  • Be Digitally Enabled
  • Be Socially Accountable
  • Support and Develop our People
  • Strengthen Academic and Research Impact

Each of the five goals outlined in the strategic plan has a number of key outcomes associated with it. In establishing their strategic plan, the hospital went through a rigorous and in-depth consultation and engagement process over the past year.

The strategic plan steering committee gathered feedback from more than 3,100 patients, employees, medical staff, learners, volunteers, foundations, community partners, as well as staff from partner hospitals across the region, who all offered their thoughts on what the future of health care should look like in Northeastern Ontario.

While Tuesday's strategic plan launch was largely focused on looking to the future, HSN board chair Nicole Everest noted that it's important to understand where the hospital has been in the past.

"The last few years have seen us overcome challenges," said Everest. "Last year, an $11-million deficit forced us to make difficult but necessary decisions. However, I'm confident that the worst is behind us and we're on track to balance our budget by April."

Everest highlighted the fact that a key factor in recruiting Dominic Giroux as the hospital's president and CEO back in 2017, was for his ability in developing and implementing a strategic plan with a clear purpose, and that articulates what is needed for the hospital and HSNRI to leap ahead.

A glossy new document with a set of goals and outcomes is one thing, but Giroux was questioned about how this will actually impact the day-to-day operation at a hospital that is constantly in a battle with bed shortages, long wait times, and hallway medicine.

"The first key goal in our strategic plan is to be patient and family-focused, and the first outcome in our strategic plan is to begin implementing by 2024 a new capital master plan," said Giroux.

"What we've done in our strategic plan is to narrow down what it is we want to accomplish with that new capital master plan. That includes new bed spaces, (and) fewer sites because right now we have 13 sites in Sudbury when we're intended to be a one-site hospital. We want to create more space for mental health and addictions care. We want to create more space for the repatriation of programs for kids and youth who have to leave the region for care."

Health Sciences North's capital master plan is expected to be released in May of this year and will speak to the hospital's physical needs for the next 20 years.

"The work we've been doing over the last few months is to document those needs, to look at the population projections where we know where we will need to expand services and expand the footprint to be responsive to the needs of our patients," said Giroux. 

"Yesterday, we had 41 patients admitted to the emergency department waiting for a bed and 37 patients in unconventional bed spaces, that's close to 80 patients waiting for a bed, so clearly northerners know that HSN was built too small and with our new capital master plan we'll be articulating our future physical footprint."

Giroux also fielded questions about recent reports that the Ontario government is gearing up for big changes to the health care system, including privatization of a number of services.

"When we look at the provincial government's priorities in terms of ending hallway medicine, or enhancing mental health and addictions care, this is exactly how we're aligning with our new strategic plan," said Giroux.

The launch of the 2019-2024 strategic plan is merely the first step in what is to be an ongoing mission for the hospital to provide quality health services to the people of northeastern Ontario, HSN said.

The hospital has established 19 teams that have each been assigned to a specific key outcome outlined in the strategic plan. The strategic plan steering committee has been dissolved, but the work to implement and carry out the plan is just getting started.

Maureen McLelland served as special advisor to the CEO of HSN and HSNRI for strategic planning, and will now be taking on the role of regional vice-president, cancer services, North East Regional Cancer Program, Cancer Care Ontario, as well as vice-president, social accountability at HSN and as chief operating officer of the Health Sciences North Research Institute (HSNRI).

"It's been a journey, and it's just really meaningful to me to see people reflect back that this is a plan that will help them move forward," said McLelland. "Whether it's patients, or community partners, or physicians, they're behind it so that's job done."

The plan is thorough yet lean, and McLelland says that there were some elements that had to be left on the cutting room floor that will return to the discussion when the hospital starts down the path for its next strategic plan.

"We had to make choices, the initial draft had 27 outcomes, my initial job was to have 25, and that went from 25 to 18 and we added one in," said McLelland. 

"There were certain things that we just deemed important but not yet. One of our digitally enabled outcomes was talking about our EMR (electronic medical record), and we had heard that mobile tablets were important to people, that they wanted to be able to bring them to the bedside, that learners wanted to have them to do their documentation, that tablet technology was something that was really important to people, but that has to connect to something cohesive and whole so we decided that it would wait and first we have to get our EMR up and if people want to use their own devices to get connected once that's in place they can. That's one of those things that was a good idea, but not yet."

The 2019-2024 strategic plan received the strongest validation possible on the governance side. It was unanimously recommended in November 2018 by a 32-member steering committee and unanimously approved by the HSN and HSNRI Boards of Directors in January 2019.

“This plan is one that clearly reflects the needs of the many communities we serve. Our boards are very excited for how this plan will shape the future of HSN and HSNRI over the next six years,” said Everest, the board chair.

Specific actions are underway to achieve the desired outcomes of the new strategic plan. For example, HSN will finalize by the summer a new capital master plan and implementation plans for an integrated regional electronic medical record and a Human Resource Information System. 

You can read the full 2019-2025 HSN and HSNRI strategic plan online at yourhsn.ca.


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