Anniversary

March 6, 2021 will mark the 10th anniversary of SAH. Since moving to this new facility we have accomplished many great things together!

Some of our current staff, physicians and volunteers were involved in the planning, build and move to this facility. Since then, our entire team has worked together to create many more accomplishments and milestones to improve the care and services we provide to the residents of Algoma.

Although we are not able to gather to celebrate this special occasion, we have developed a special anniversary video which will be available in the near future.

Stay tuned for information about how you can participate in this virtual celebration.

Congratulations to Bonnie Hore of Gore Bay who won the recent $250,372.50 jackpot in the Sault Area Hospital Foundation’s (SAHF) January electronic and online 50/50 draw.

Bonnie, who grew up in Sault Ste. Marie, moved to Gore Bay in the 70s. Although Manitoulin Island is where she has lived for over 40 years, heading to Sault Ste. Marie is ‘heading home’. Bonnie and her family are excited by their win, and have big plans to travel and share it with the people and organizations that mean the most to them.

Visit www.soo5050.ca to purchase your monthly draw tickets. Everyone wins when you support SAH!

Congratulations to Dr. David Berry who’s abstract, Application of big data in healthcare: examination of the military was recently published in Health and Technology, a cross-disciplinary journal on issues related to health technologies.

The journal constitutes an information platform connecting medical technology and informatics with the needs of care, health care professionals and patients.

We salute Dr. Berry on this great success!

The newly approved Service Animal Policy will help promote inclusion and remove barriers at SAH. Service animals are not pets but animals trained to provide assistance to a person with a given disability.

When a service animal accompanies a worker, patient or visitor, it is the responsibility of each of us to make every attempt to ensure that the animal is granted access into all public areas of the hospital permitted to others, with very few exceptions.

“Finding ways to ensure we are accessible is not only the right thing to do, but it also ensures that we adhere to the Ontarians with Disabilities Act,” says Chris Belsito, Strategy and Business Planning Specialist, who also Chairs SAH’s Accessibility Committee.

The legislation mandates that service animals be allowed access to places of public accommodation. “This policy provides definitions for service and emotional support animals, procedures to help support the identification of support animals, the roles and responsibilities of workers and service animal owners, access exceptions, as well as decision making guidelines.”

The new policy can be found on the intranet under Knowledge Base/Policies and Procedures/ Administrative Policies/Service Animals Policy

The Service Animal Policy was developed by Sault Area Hospital’s Accessibility Committee. For more information, please contact Chris Belsito at ext. 7041.

Our Cardiology Program has offered PCI services in the Cardiac Cath Lab since August 2018. The addition of this service was a significant milestone for access to care closer to home for our community.

Almost one year ago we secured a permanent full time local Interventional Cardiologist on staff at SAH, providing services, along with our partners from St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto. Over the past 2 ½ years, these physicians and the Cardiac Cath Lab staff have been able to provide emergency access to PCI as needed on an ad hoc basis, avoiding transfers out of the community for our patients and families.

As part of our continued effort to improve the Cardiology Program and services that we provide to our community, we have formalized a 24/7 model of care for urgent PCI. A Cardiac Cath Lab team will be on call for urgent cases (such as STEMIs or unstable NSTEMIs) that present after hours.