Semifinal fight for Islanders page 30
Suspect sought by police page 11
Thursday July 10, 2014
Serving Surrey and North Delta www.surreyleader.com
Full merger of health authorities ruled out in government review
Back in Surrey’s old days
Fraser Health targets ER overuse
The Re-Enactors bring pioneer experiences to life
by Jeff Nagel
A SEVEN-MONTH REVIEW of Fraser Health has resulted in a new strategy that focuses on cutting unnecessary use of hospital emergency rooms in favour of improved primary and community care. Health Minister Terry Lake said Wednesday too many patients in the region aren’t getting the appropriate type of care and suffering worse outcomes, compared to other peer hospitals in Canada. “When you provide that care in the community, you take the pressure off the acute care setting,” Lake said. “That helps look after your budget problem as well.” Average lengths of hospital stays are longer in Fraser, Lake said, increasing risks of picking up infections in hospital or problems like bed sores. The concept is far from new. Fraser has been trying for years to clear its congested ERs with a shift to preventative or home health care. Although Lake did not criticize past efforts, he said the time was right for a strategic “data-driven” re-examination of the Terry Lake issues for the region, whose staff had been too bogged down in “putting out fires.” Some of the overuse of hospital ERs instead of community clinics may be related to cultural differences among the region’s large South Asian population, Lake said. The region will get a modest infusion of extra money – $40 million in 2014/15 and $20 million in 2015/16 – to assist with opening up community care beds during the transition. Lake said the findings confirmed Fraser’s budget of $3.1 billion has been appropriate in recent years, in light of its population of 1.7 million, rapid growth rate and demographics. “It’s not a matter of dollars,” he said. Funding for Fraser is slated to climb 4.3 per cent in 2014, 1.4 per cent in 2015 and 1.2 per cent to more than $3.3 billion in 2016. The review was ordered by Lake last November, largely in response to the health authority’s inability to avoid successive budget overruns. See PLAN / Page 4
by Boaz Joseph
T
BOAZ JOSEPH / THE LEADER
Surrey pioneer teacher Mary Jane Shannon (Sara Holt) talks to visiting ‘students’ in a classroom at Sullivan Station during a presentation by the Re-Enactors. The group of professional actors recreate the lives of the area’s earliest settlers, performing at various events and venues around the city throughout the summer.
Editorial 6 Sports 30 Classifieds 36
eacher Mary Jane Shannon runs a tight ship. When class begins, students must stand, call out: “Good afternoon, Miss Shannon,” then sing the hymn God Save the King. Today, after a strict lesson in spelling (it’s “c-a-r-i-b-o-o”) and some local history, someone mentions an iPad. The teacher, smart as a whip, asks in her distinctive Irish accent: “Is that for washing dishes, dear?” Sounds reasonable. It is, after all, June 8, 1906 – it says so on a chalkboard in the classroom inside the Cloverdale Heritage Railway Station, where several families are meeting with Surrey’s Re-Enactors following a train ride and a greeting with the local Reeve, T.J. Sullivan. The Re-Enactors are back from the past for a third year, a heritage troupe that brings Surrey’s history to life through five pioneers during the period of 1872 to 1945. The characters, who will have made 20 visits to local events by the end of September, include the reallife figures of: • Reeve T.J. Sullivan, who joined his brother to set up a sawmill in Surrey in 1903, and went See RE-ENACTORS / Page 7
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