The formation of a new council that seeks to improve delivery of healthcare services throughout Ontario was announced recently at a Toronto conference on Best Practices for Ontario’s Evolving Healthcare System.
The SAS Canada Healthcare Advisory Council includes prominent industry experts and innovators who are all dedicated to improving the delivery of healthcare services throughout the province.
“Healthcare services in Ontario are undergoing massive change right now,” said Michael Turney, Manager, Strategy and Market Development at SAS Canada. “The issues we are tackling with this council encompass not only using best of breed technology practices, but take into account the whole healthcare process from handling and analyzing patient records to disease prevention and management,”
At the Council’s inaugural meeting, Dr. Adalsteinn Brown, assistant professor in the Department of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation at the University of Toronto, was elected as the Council chair for 2006. Dr. Brown is also Information Management Lead for the Ministry of Health & Long-Term Care’s Health Results Team.
Dr. Brown highlighted potential areas of focus for the group including such issues as sourcing, securing and managing data for primary care systems, and closing-the-loop with diagnostic outcomes, as well as the relevance of a Balanced Scorecard approach to performance management for Canadian Hospitals and the recently created Local Health Integration Networks.