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Volume 6, Issue 27
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OB IS SAVED By Sheila McBrayne Obstetrics services at Leamington District Memorial Hospital truly have been saved and CEO Terry Shields credits the community for making this happen. “No lights on, lights off – it’s like it always has been with no interruption or change in services. The lights are definitely on and it will always be staffed,” he said. The financial reprieve is the result of LDMH being allocated $1 million, onetime funding over two years from the Erie St. Clair Local Integrated Health Network for 10 rehab beds. The Hospital and the ESC LHIN are working on the details of this funding now. “We are only allotted so much money in our budget and it’s a matter of where the money is spent… Now we have the funds to make it work without losing any services,” said Shields. “And we have the community to thank for that! They pulled together to bring national attention to our situation with the Save OB initiative,” he said. The hospital is actively seeking a second OB/GYN. “We’ve talked to nine, and hope to have three or four of them for a site visit in August,” said Shields. “So it’s good news all around! OB remains the same as it always has been with the addition of the navigational centre – which is in the process of being coordinated – and we have 10 rehab beds,” said Shields. “Our Board had to make some tough decisions based
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on the budget at that time and based on recommendations in the Hay Report, and
now after the public outcry, we have more money to work with,” said Shields. “We’re all very happy to be able to change the decision to close OB,” added Shields. Leamington hospital is planning a Celebration of Services to thank the community for becoming more involved in their local hospital and effecting change. “We’re looking at September 17th – details to follow, but I think the community needs to celebrate the services their hospital provides,” said Shields. “It’ll be a great chance to celebrate and educate the community on the first-class services offered at their hometown hospital… We heard many people who didn’t know what services were available at LDMH – yes, you can get an epidural or C-section – and this has been a great chance to educate the community,” said Shields. Shields, who took over the helm at LDMH as CEO in 2012, says there are many challenges for the hospital as
AUGUST
8TH
the health care system funding is always a challenge for small hospitals. “We’re not out of the woods yet, there’s always the next challenge and that’s the Emergency Department… Our attention
“No lights on, lights off – it’s like it always has been with no interruption or change in services. The lights are definitely on. And it will always be staffed.” - Terry Shields now is on our ED. According to the Ministry’s funding formula we must have 29,000 ED visits each year; if we have two consecutive years below 29,000 we stand to lose about $800,000 in funding… last year we had
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need people to use it and not travel out of the area for ED services,” said Shields. “We need the community to support its hospital and we want to improve the patient experience by making the wait area more pleasant and comfortable.” Last week’s announcement of the location of the Windsor mega hospital on the east end of Windsor (beside Windsor Airport) was welcomed by the Leamington CEO. “We have great partnerships with Hotel Dieu and Windsor Regional – we’re happy with the location, it really won’t affect us,” said Shields. He believes the announcement of the location will create growth all around that area long before the hospital will be completed. “Even the talk about this mega hospital creates a bigger buzz for this area… This will be a state-of-theart facility that we can work with,” said Shields.
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28,663,” stated Shields. LDMH has a unique problem in that it’s too big to be considered a small hospital (under 2,700 weighted cases) and it’s not big enough to benefit from the higher volumes of big hospitals, which benefit most from the P4R Ministry funding formula. “It’s so marginal, it’s disappointing that they don’t look at how close we are, but close doesn’t count… The funding model is really tough for hospitals of our size,” said Shields. LDMH has won the title of the shortest ED wait times in the Erie St. Clair LHIN. The ED waiting room area is being revamped to make that wait a more comfortable experience as well. A free Coffee Café is being added, as well as a social media centre for visitors. “Our Emergency Department is one of the best in the area; we just
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