North East LHIN Helps Plan a Northern Ontario Health Equity Strategy

Louise Paquette, CEO, North East LHIN, along with Dr. Jeffrey Turnbull, Chief of Clinical Quality with Health Quality Ontario (left), and Dr. Penny Sutcliffe, Medical Officer of Health and CEO of the Sudbury and District Health Unit (right) discussed health equity gaps in Northern Ontario as well as ideas for future work during a panel discussion held at the Northern Ontario School of Medicine in Sudbury on November 23.

The goal of the planning session, involving many system partners, was to put in motion some of the development of a Northern Ontario Health Equity Strategy.

Paquette talked about how having smaller rural populations that are dispersed across a large geography, puts Northerners at a disadvantage in accessing some provincial programs made for larger urban populations.

The North East LHIN recognizes housing as one of the social determinants of health and recently released a strategy called, Innovative Housing with Health Supports in Northeastern Ontario Strategic Plan: 2016-2019, to address housing needs in the region, as well as one focusing on the inequities experienced by Indigenous people in its

North East Local Health Integration Network (NE LHIN) Aboriginal Health Care Reconciliation Action Plan.. The LHIN also recognizes transportation as a huge issue that needs to be an integral part of a Northern Health Equity Strategy.

Other members of the panel included Sharon Lee Smith, Associate Deputy Minister of Delivery and Implementation with the Ministry of Health and Long Term Care, and by videoconference in Thunder Bay, Diane Quintas, CEO of the Réseau du mieux-être francophone du Nord de l’Ontario, and Alex Vistorino, Acting Co-Director, Health System Design & Development with the North West LHIN.

For more information contact: Lara Bradley, North East LHIN Communications Officer, at lara.bradley@lhins.on.ca or 705-674-1492

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