The Northern Health Region (NHR) recently released its 2016 to 2021 strategic plan and much of it is carried over from the previous plan.
Joy Tetlock, vice-president of planning and innovation for the NHR, said through feedback board members received, as well as data collected, it was clear the health region would continue its current direction.
The NHR has four strategic directions from the previous plan, but Tetlock says there are some changes.
“What has changed are the actual priorities under each of the strategic directions,” she said. “They’re much more focused this time. They’re very focused on how we improve access to services, how we can bring services closer to home, and that’s really a big focus for the next five years going forward.”
The first direction is to improve population health. Priorities include focusing on prevention and promotion activities, as well as improving health equity throughout the region.
The second direction is to deliver accessible, quality health services. The NHR says it will do that by improving access to health services and promoting a culture of patient safety.
The third direction is to be a sustainable and innovative organization. Priorities for this direction include increasing services close to home as appropriate and ensuring fiscal responsibility.
The final strategic direction for the five-year plan is to be an employer of choice. The NHR says that can happen by enhancing recruitment and enhancing employee engagement.
With every direction there are also key performance measures, and those are tallied monthly and annually to keep up with the progress the NHR is making.
Those performance measures include measuring community mental health services wait time, premature mortality rates, the number of non-core specialist patient encounters, turnover rate and patient experience rates.
The process of creating a strategic plan is not simple or fast, says Tetlock. “We’re legislated to do a community health assessment every five years, and that’s a kickoff for our cycle,” she said. “That assessment consists of over 80 core indicators that we have to report on so they’re on the health stats of the region. They give us our baseline and we use that data and feedback from community, feedback from individuals, stakeholders, as well as feedback from staff.”
After that takes place, Tetlock says the board reviews all the information and then works with an outside consultant to look at what the directions need to be.
The document is now available for all NHR staff, and managers will refer to the plan to develop operational plans for their employees.
Tetlock says education on the plan will begin in the fall. The plan comes in effect January 1, 2016.
Moving Forward
The four directions outlined in the Northern Health Region’s five-year strategic plan:
• Improve population health.
• Deliver accessible, quality health services.
• Be a sustainable and innovative organization.
• Be an employer of choice.– Thompson Citizen
