Ultimate Blogging Championship

Tag: Success Stories

  • Celebrating the 10th anniversary of Family Health Teams in Ontario

    Ten years ago the concept of “Family Health Teams” was first announced. This anniversary follows a week in which two important studies have published evidence of the value of interprofessional collaboration in Ontario’s Family Health Teams, and in interprofessional primary care models across Canada. To mark this event, the Association of Family Health Teams of Ontario received recognition in Ontario’s Legislature and issued the news release below.

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    Ontario’s Family Care Teams are Providing Better Care and Better Value to Patients March 17th – Toronto – On the 10th anniversary of the creation of Family Health Teams in Ontario, the Association of Family Health Teams of Ontario (AFHTO), proclaimed the success of team-based primary care models to enhance patient outcomes, save the province money, and improve patient and provider satisfaction. “Evidence from around the world and right here in Ontario show that when patients have access to high quality, team-based primary care that patients, providers and the health care system all benefit from improved health outcomes at a better cost,” said Angie Heydon, Executive Director of AFHTO. “As a result, we believe all patients should have access to this high standard of care in the province.” A recent Ontario study concluded that interprofessional care is resulting in:

    • Enhanced access to primary care and other health care services.
    • Improved coordination, collaboration and patient-centredness.
    • Better clinical outcomes.
    • Enhanced patient and provider satisfaction.
    • More system efficiency.
    • Decreased wait times for primary care, diagnostic testing and mental health assessments.

    AFHTO is embarking on a province-wide campaign to enlist support from MPPs of all parties in the hopes of securing broad support for the expansion and enhancement of family care teams in the province as soon as possible. “Family care teams are providing care to almost a million people who didn’t previously have a doctor. They’re keeping patients out of the emergency rooms. And they’re helping enhance disease prevention and health promotion initiatives in the province.” Remarked Keri Selkirk, AFHTO President and Executive Director of the Thames Valley Family Health Team, “We’re providing better care, and saving the province money. It just makes sense to redouble efforts to ensure that more patients are benefitting from this care.” AFHTO is a not-for-profit association representing Ontario’s family care teams, which includes Family Health Teams, Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinics, and others who provide interprofessional comprehensive primary care. 

  • Championing Innovation in Quality Improvement Decision Support

    The Association of Family Health Teams of Ontario (AFHTO) is pleased to announce the six recipients of Quality Improvement Decision Support (QIDS) Innovation Funds. Ontario Family Health Teams (FHTs) are committed to measuring and improving comprehensive primary care performance; the QIDS program is a provincial initiative to support AFHTO members in their quality improvement (QI) efforts.

    More than 25 FHTs are involved in these six member-led projects. The projects will serve as catalysts for sector-wide capacity building in advanced measurement and improvement capability. The grant recipients are accelerating progress in the use of data management tools and techniques, implementation of multi-practice performance measurement and feedback, and other QI strategic priorities.

    AFHTO is excited to support this cutting edge QI innovation in primary care, and will facilitate knowledge sharing and dissemination of award winners’ lessons learned and best practices among all members. The six grant recipients are as follows; scroll below for more detailed information:

    • Building QIDS capacity through pilot testing of the Starfield Model
      • Leads: Dr. Rick Glazier, St. Michael’s Hospital Academic Family Health Team and ICES and Dr. George Southey, Dorval Medical FHT
    • Readiness and prioritization assessment for adoption and implementation of a minimal clinical data set
      • Lead:  Mary Keith, Executive Director, Garden City Family Health Team
    • Performance Management Framework and Dashboard- A data storybook and performance song sheet!
      • Lead: Heba Sadek, Executive Director, Queen’s Square Family Health Team
    • Patient Encounter and Reporting Tracking System for primary care quality improvement reporting
      • Lead: Michelle Karker, Executive Director, East Wellington Family Health Team
    • QIDS based information management clusters:  leveraging privacy infrastructure, standardized EMR data and scalable analytic tools for groups of Family Health Teams
      • Lead: Dr. Michelle Griever, North York Family Health Team
    • Creating the tools for fostering a culture of quality improvement in Family Health Teams
      • Lead: Dr. Sanjeev Goel, Wise Elephant Downtown Brampton Family Health Team

    Background The QIDS Innovation Fund is intended to advance measurement and improvement capacity to enable all members to benefit from better tools, knowledge and capability. An invitation to apply for the QIDS Innovation Fund was extended in December 2013, and members responded with 18 proposals that addressed these goals and then some! This impressive response by members signifies the widespread commitment to quality improvement by the sector.  

    Given the wealth of proposal submissions, the selection process was very difficult. Once again, the AFHTO Board would like to thank and congratulate all those who took the time to submit proposals. A special thanks goes to the review panel, which was chaired by Ross Kirkconnell, Executive Director, Guelph FHT and included Brenda Fraser, Central West Local Health Integration Network (well known to many from her work at the Quality Improvement and Innovation Partnership) and Dr. Darren Larsen of OntarioMD and the Ontario Medical Association.

    AFHTO would also like to acknowledge and express its sincere thanks to the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care for the flexibility and support that permitted the provincial QIDS program funding to be allocated in this novel and creative way.

    Grant recipients

    Building QIDS capacity through pilot testing of the Starfield Model

    Leads: Dr. Rick Glazier, St. Michael’s Hospital Academic FHT and ICES and Dr. George Southey, Dorval Medical FHT

    The goal of this project is to pilot the Starfield Model, a measurement framework for comprehensive primary care based on the principles enunciated by Barbara Starfield and endorsed by AFHTO. The project will directly support AFHTO’s strategic goals by building capacity to measure key elements of comprehensive primary care. Many of the required measures are only beginning to become available and few are in routine use across FHTs or other models of primary care in Ontario. Pilot testing will identify areas of commonalities and differences in measures and approaches and will contribute to further development and standardization.

    Readiness and prioritization assessment for adoption and implementation of a minimal clinical data set

    Lead:  Mary Keith, Executive Director, Garden City FHT

    This is a project aimed at determining both the readiness and priorities of the various FHTs in LHIN 4 regarding a minimum measurable set of data items needed to track specific chronic conditions. Data collection will occur through an online questionnaire. Results of the MDS project should be ready by mid April 2014 and will provide our group with metrics for care management that will assist in the planning and implementation of projects for quality improvement in patient care.This project is being led by Mary Keith, with the assistance of Urslin Fevrier-Thomas and Karl Langton, both from the Hamilton FHT.

    Performance Management Framework and Dashboard- A data storybook and performance song sheet!

    Lead: Heba Sadek, Executive Director, Queen’s Square FHT

    In the absence of a structural tool that enables organizations to organize and understand their accountability requirements, the response to quality initiatives can be frustrating and ad hoc. Through this initiative Queen Square and its partners: Dufferin Area, Halton Hills and North Peel FHTs will identify a common framework for data mapping that will show how different indicators are used to meet different accountability requirements. Clinicians’ input will also be sought in indicator development and standardization that meets their needs and aligns with the Primary Care Performance Framework.

    Patient Encounter and Reporting Tracking System for primary care quality improvement reporting

    Lead: Michelle Karker, Executive Director, East Wellington FHT

    The East Wellington FHT (EWFHT) has been a leader in the development of tools to extract data from its EMR, including data that is now required for Quality Improvement Plans and Ministry reporting. Advanced prototypes are already in existence. This project funding will enable EWFHT to further refine the programming and respond to the requests to share these tools across with its QIDS partners and potentially across the province.

    QIDS based information management clusters:  leveraging privacy infrastructure, standardized EMR data and scalable analytic tools for groups of FHTs

    Lead: Dr. Michelle Griever, North York FHT

    This project will collaboratively develop methods to implement centralized information management for each cluster within a partnership that includes Kingston, Hamilton and North York FHT clusters. The aim is to allow the QIDS Specialist to manage data for several affiliated FHTs from a single secure location, while respecting privacy. The project will develop a customizable, agreed-upon memorandum of understanding for data use, a privacy and security manual compliant with legislation, and secure processes for rolling out reporting software controlled through each cluster’s governance policies.

    Creating the tools for fostering a culture of quality improvement in FHTs

    Lead: Dr. Sanjeev Goel, Wise Elephant Downtown Brampton FHT

    The goal of this project is to enhance a current reporting dashboard platform to enable all FHTs from across the province, irrespective of their EMRs, to contribute their data on a set of defined, extractable core indicators. The project will use these core indicators, create innovative solutions for FHTs to contribute this data securely, and then present this data back to FHTs for their consumption.  Access to their own data along with aggregate data from other FHTs will stimulate groups to advance their quality improvement plans. Aggregate data from FHTs will also enable global reporting on FHT performance on these indicators, allowing AFHTO to evaluate current team-based models of care and advocate for scale up of models that are leading to improved health outcomes and health care system sustainability.

    For more information on any of these projects, please contact improve@afhto.ca.

  • “Bright Lights” award nominations: opportunity for grant to attend IHI Conference

    The first ever “Bright Lights” awards will be presented at the AFHTO 2012 Conference Awards Dinner, on October 16.  This award program recognizes the leadership, outstanding work and significant progress being made to improve the value delivered by Family Health Teams. There are 11 award categories corresponding to the themes of the AFHTO 2012 Conference. In one of the award categories – Best Practices in Health Promotion and Chronic Care – four winners will be supported to attend the Institute for Healthcare Improvement Conference on April 7-9, 2013, in Scottsdale, Arizona. With this award sponsorship now in place, nominations for all of the award categories are being re-opened.  Application deadline is Tuesday, September 4, 2012. Awards for Best Practices in Health Promotion and Chronic Care

    • Boehringer Ingelheim is sponsoring a grant of $3000 for each of four FHTs ($12,000 in total) that demonstrate strong performance in Health Promotion and Chronic Care programs.  Examples include programs targeted to healthy living, weight control, hypertension/cardiovascular disease, lung health/respiratory disease, diabetes, chronic pain, etc.
    • The $3,000 grant is to be used by the FHT to send one team member to the 14th Annual International Summit on Improving Patient Care in the Office Practice & the Community, hosted by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI).
    • Award recipients are asked to share their learning from the IHI Conference within their Family Health Team and/or with others as appropriate.
    • To be considered for an award in the Best Practices in Health Promotion and Chronic Care category, the FHT must be an AFHTO member and the nomination form must be completed for this category, on line, in full. Click here to access the Health Promotion and Chronic Care nomination form. (Supporting data may be e-mailed separately to info@afhto.ca ).
    • Award recipients will be selected by an independent panel consisting of four AFHTO board members at arm’s length from the nominees.
    • The award sponsor will present the four awards at the AFHTO Conference Dinner.  The sponsor has no other involvement in the program – it has no role in establishment of award criteria, call for nominations, judging nor selection of the program winners.

    Awards for all other categories

    • To nominate an individual or FHT for recognition as a “Bright Light”, please complete the generic award nomination form, on line, in full.  Click here to access the generic nomination form.
    • Award recipients will be selected by an independent panel consisting of four AFHTO board members at arm’s length from the nominees.
    • Recipients will receive an award that can be proudly displayed in FHT waiting rooms or offices.
    • Recognition will also include a write-up on the AFHTO website and e-mail blast.

    Click here to print this notice and post it in your FHT.