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Health care, education, and downtown businesses How will massive growth affect these key areas of life in Kawartha Lakes? By Kirk Winter
The Advocate has been exploring the explosive growth expected in Kawartha Lakes over the next 10 years. With Lindsay’s population set to almost double within a decade, we explore how health care and education are being affected, city-wide, and shine a spotlight on Lindsay’s downtown.
Health care Almost every small city in Ontario has a well-respected publicly funded hospital that not only is one of the community’s major employers, but a lynch pin in attracting new people and new industry to the city.
Ryan Young, communications officer for RMH, said that planning is in the works to meet the needs of a much larger community. “Planning is well underway to expand RMH’s critical care capacity, to meet such needs,” Young said. “The hospital’s 20-year masterplan has been submitted to the Ontario Ministry of Health for approval to proceed to the next planning stage.” Young added that anticipated population growth helps inform the hospital’s master planning, along with their strategic planning and directions.
Lindsay is no different than those communities, with Ross Memorial Hospital (RMH) providing quality medical care to people right across the old Victoria County, and now Kawartha Lakes since 1902.
As part of the hospital’s strategic priorities, RMH has committed to collaborating and partnering with their Ontario Health Team and community partners to identify and address community needs.
RMH, unfortunately, is already finding its facility inadequate for the needs of the community, with wait times in the emergency room sometimes exceeding 12 hours. With a chronic shortage of family doctors in the city, the hospital and associated walk-in clinics have been overwhelmed providing the primary care that should be delivered by family doctors.
Young told the Advocate that local MPP Laurie Scott “has been a strong advocate for our hospital and the healthcare services our community relies upon.”
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Doctor shortages The Kawartha Lakes Health Care Initiative (KLHCI), led by Cindy Snider and a group of volunteers, has the mandate of