First five Patient Medical Homes launched

Patient medical homes have been formed at five Island primary care locations, beginning the shift in primary health care from solo family practices to collaborative health care and better access to care for Islanders. 

Patient Medical Homes deliver team-based care through a model that has been developed and endorsed by the College of Family Physicians of Canada (CFPC). 

The first five Patient Medical Homes have launched at the following locations:

• Polyclinic and Parkdale Medical Centre, Charlottetown
• Sherwood Medical Centre, Charlottetown 
• Kinlock Medical Centre, Stratford
• Kensington Health Centre, Kensington
• Cornwall/Crapaud Health Centres, Cornwall and Crapaud

Additional health care providers across the province are in development and are at various stages of signing on to provide team-based care. 

The teams at each home will include multiple professionals, each working collaboratively within the team to their full scope of care. This shift will allow Islanders attached to Patient Medical Homes to have greater access to care to see health care providers more quickly.

“The launch of these five medical homes is a milestone along our journey to transforming primary care on PEI. By establishing collaborative, team-based care across the Island, this is a key step in building capacity and resiliency within the system, while supporting our health care providers in these teams to provide the best, most appropriate care for the population.

Working as a team, our health care providers are more than the sum of their parts, and Islanders will benefit from greater access to care and access to the right professional, more quickly.”

 - Ernie Hudson, Minister of Health and Wellness.

The teams will continue to add health professionals as required to serve their populations in the coming months as the nurses, physicians, and allied health care providers on each team develop their practices. 

“Today’s announcement is an important step toward transforming Primary Care. I am incredibly proud of the work each team has done to get here and I am proud of the work of the Health PEI and Department of Health and Wellness implementation team, which supports this transition,” said Dr. Katherine McNally, Chief Medical Officer, Health PEI. “This is a crucial step, but it is still an early step in the transition of Primary Care into a system that is sustainable, where health care providers in the province provide care as part of a team.”

Islanders who are currently patients of practices that transition to Patient Medical Homes will remain as patients with the clinics they are used to visiting. 

One change people will notice is that the family physician may not be the person you see for your health issue. For example, if your concern can be addressed by a dietitian, that professional may see you instead of a family physician. This change will help ensure people who need care get access to it more quickly. 

Teams will use the community electronic health record to enable more seamless information sharing and shared care between health professionals.

“By coordinating care to ensure the most appropriate care providers sees you for your health concern, patients receive the best care possible, while also making the best use of our health care providers’ time,” said Dr. McNally. 

Over time, as teams mature, build their capacity and add new health care professions, new patients will be assigned to the patient medical homes.  

Patient Medical Homes will be key in recruiting medical professionals to our province as the style of practice more closely aligns with the desires of physicians and other health care providers.    
 
Backgrounder

Primary care is an essential initial and ongoing point of contact with the health system for community members to maintain health and wellness. 

Primary care is offered by a broad range of providers who direct services such as diagnosis, screening, acute and ongoing treatment, education, and disease prevention and management. These providers also coordinate referrals and contacts with other health and community service providers to enable effective, comprehensive patient care. 

On PEI, primary care includes offices and health care centres located in primary care networks distributed across the Province. 

The two-year primary care road map is a path forward to achieve continued progress in ensuring quality, equitable and patient-focused primary care services on Prince Edward Island.

Implementation of the new Primary Care Roadmap is intended to modernize how primary health care services are offered to Islanders by establishing Patient Medical Homes within Medical Neighbourhoods. 

The road map focuses on developing and supporting collaborative team-based practices, where health, social and community providers use a community health approach to strengthen the integration of services and work towards innovative solutions to improve the health of Islanders.

The Patient Medical Homes lay at the centre of the model where Islanders receive care from a variety of health care professionals, including physicians, nurse practitioners, registered nurses, social workers, and dietitians. These homes are a part of a medical neighbourhood that includes one or more other homes. 

This new collaborative model is the preferred model of health care providers. The overwhelming majority of new family medicine graduates hope to work in a collaborative team-based setting. 

Media Contact: 
Everton McLean
Communications, Health PEI
902-213-1507
emclean@gov.pe.ca