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WOW! what an accomplishment! In
only 5 years Brightonians have raised over 2 million dollars to go
towards our Health Centre. However, we still need donations to
reduce the current debt. How quickly are we to forget that, 5 years
ago there were not enough physicians to look after our population,
now, we have 5,200 patients being seen by physicians right here in
Brighton. The Board of Directors would like to thank the residents
of Brighton for their generosity.
Click here to download a
copy of the 2006 Brighton Health Services Centre AGM Minutes.
- BHSC finances very favourable: Brian
Todd
by John Chambers, The Independent, May 3, 2006.
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Brian Todd presents
Brighton Mayor Chris Herrington with a cheque for
$38,616.57 as part of the BHSC's loan repayment plan
Monday night during Brighton council.
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It isn't everyday that a member of
the community appears before Brighton council to give them money,
but on Monday night Brian Todd, representing the Brighton Health
Services Centre, did just that.
Delivering a cheque for $38,616.57
as part of the BHSC's loan repayment promise, Mr. Todd told members
of council the Health Centre is in very good shape, and suggested
the original 10-year loan could likely be paid off in five years.
To date we have received a total of
$1,968,234 in donations, Mr. Todd said. We have a total of 2,155
donors, about one of every three Brighton adults.
The highest loan balance for the
BHSC came on April 30, 2004 and stood at $1,251,286.76, and in the
past two years $675,000 of that has been repaid. Only $225,000 has
been required as part of the loan agreement with the municipality,
but community support, donations and a stronger financial footing
have allowed BHSC officials to repay the loan considerably faster.
So far the BHSC has paid $72,672.55
in interest to the municipality, and while taxes have more than
doubled in the last couple of years, Mr. Todd said he was optimistic
the loan would be repaid much sooner than originally anticipated.
In 2002, property taxes prior to the
renovation of the building were $17,000, Mr. Todd said. In 2005 they
were $29,000 and we estimate that with the MPAC re-assessment taxes
will be about $33,000 this year; so property taxes have more than
doubled since going from a banquet hall to a health centre.
Since 2003 the municipality has
forgiven $225,000 in debt, $75,000 in each of 2003/04, 2004/05 and
2005/06, and the municipality has provided $39,250 in health
dividends. Currently the original loan has a balance of $462,036.76
said Mr. Todd.
I anticipate we will be in much
better shape than we have been in the past, said Mr. Todd. I am
anticipating that we will have the loan paid by April of 2008; a 10
year loan repaid in five years.
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McGuinty Government Delivers New
Family Health Teams
http://www.premier.gov.on.ca/english/news/FamilyHealth041505.asp
- McGuinty announces health teams.
The Independent, April 20th, 2005
by Brendan Wedley
Brighton is being held
up as a model for the province, Premier Dalton McGuinty said during
a press conference at the Brighton Health Services Centre April 15.
The premier rolled into
town with Health Minister George Smitherman and Northumberland-Quinte
West Liberal MPP Lou Rinaldi Friday morning to announce the creation
of 52 family health teams across the province – including one in
Brighton.
Mr. McGuinty said he learned that
everybody in the Brighton community supported its bid for a health
team. “Then I learned that there were a number of other communities
as well but I didn’t find one that was as relentless as this one in
terms of making its case,” he told a packed room in the health
services centre. “I want you people to know that you helped us lend
shape to the concept.”
Mr. Smitherman referred to Brighton
as “the family health team poster community.”
A family health team is a
co-operative group of health care providers that share a building.
Its makeup is determined by the individual community; it could
include doctors, nurse practitioners, registered nurses, dietitians,
pharmacists and any other health professional the health team
decides to recruit.
Family health teams will provide
care to patients during extended hours and on weekends. Doctors
within the teams will have access to each other’s patient records to
allow patients to see a doctor even if theirs is not available.
“What it means to you as patients is
that you get a comprehensive system of care,” said Mr. McGuinty.
“It’s kind of like one-stop shopping.”
Besides Brighton, other Quinte area
communities among the 52 to receive a family health team are
Campbellford, Picton, Bancroft, Sharbot Lake and two in Kingston.
NDP Health Critic Shelley Martel,
however, said she’s underwhelmed by the McGuinty Liberal
government’s family health team announcement: “The Minister of
Health was forced to admit that half of the teams announced today
are really just existing doctor group practices who are switching to
a new model,” said Ms. Martel. “You add one or two health
practitioners – a nurse, a physiotherapist, a dietitian – and you
give it a new name. But does it translate into better access to
primary care for ordinary Ontarians? That remains to be seen.”
The government said the goal of
health teams is to address severe doctor shortages.
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Projected cost of $77 million for 52 health teams
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Brendan Wedley photo
Coun. Roy Rittwage, right,
reads a prepared statement by Mayor Chris Herrington
regarding the announcement by Premier Dalton McGuinty,
left, and Brighton Health Services board chair Brian
Todd, middle, that a family health team will be
established at the health centre, April 15.
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The teams are projected to cost the
provincial government $77 million this fiscal year. By 2008, the
initiative will expand to 150 family health teams, with an estimated
cost of $300 million.
The Ministry of Health and Long-Term
Care received 213 applications for family health teams. About 1,300
doctors were involved in the applications.
Brian Todd, chair of the Brighton
Health Services Centre board, said he hopes to recruit two
physicians and a nurse practitioner by the end of the year. “I’m not
sure what else we should be looking at because we’re at the design
stage,” he said. “Nobody has done this. “It’s quite fluid.” Mr. Todd
raised the possibility of adding a radiologist to the Brighton
health team.
Until now, the community has covered
the cost of the health centre. Building the centre, with a paperless
office and wireless capabilities, came at a cost of $2.2 million –
$1.7 million of that is paid off.
Now the community isn’t alone in the
endeavour. “The government, financially, is going to help with this
whole activity,” Mr. Todd said. But the amount of financing coming
to Brighton is still uncertain. It depends on the makeup of the team
and other variables.
Mr. Todd said the family health team
initiative is still a work-in-progress. These 52 test cases for the
family health team concept are expected to provide health care for
more than one million patients.
According to the health ministry,
physicians working in interdisciplinary group practices see up to 52
per cent more patients than those working in stand-alone practices.
“When we fill these offices with
other health care practitioners we’re going to make sure that the
patients that were orphaned will be orphaned no longer,” said Mr.
Smitherman. “We’ll be able to take this community off that long list
of underserviced communities in the province of Ontario.” The doctor
shortage affects about one million people in Ontario.
Some of the teams, like Brighton,
are expected to be operational in the next few months. The creation
of a family health team in Campbellford will improve the delivery of
primary health care in Trent Hills but how soon that will happen
remains to be seen. The negotiations will determine “what we’re
actually going to get,” Campbellford Memorial Hospital chief
executive officer Kelly Isfan said. The team will be based at
Campbellford Memorial Health Centre. Fully implementing the plan
could take up to a year, cautioned Dr. Robert Henderson, the
hospital’s chief of staff.
When in place, the family health
team will enable doctors to see more patients as nurse
practitioners, with supervision, “can do 75 per cent of the work”
that a physician does, Mr. Rinaldi said. That will relieve pressure
on the hospital’s emergency department where many people currently
go for their primary health care. Campbellford hospital will also
benefit from sharing services with the family health team as it
works toward achieving a balanced budget.
Mr. Rinaldi later told reporters his
government’s controversial health care premium has made it possible
for the province to come up with the money for the new health care
model and other initiatives.
Family health teams will attract
doctors, said Mr. McGuinty. “They get to work as part of a team, in
a collaborative effort, so that they are supported,” he said. “They
can spend more time actually practicing medicine, which is why they
went to medical school in the first place.”
Once doctors are in a family health
team there’s a financial incentive for them to have as many patients
as possible. Instead of the traditional fee-for-services form of
billing, doctors will be paid based on the number of patients they
have on roster.
Mr. McGuinty said he’s confident the
system will work. But when faced with the question of why doctors
would choose to join these centres next week when they didn’t last
week, his response was simple and realistic: “Let’s watch and see.”
with a file from John Campbell
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An
application to have a Family Health Team in Brighton has been
submitted.
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Annual General Meeting
was held February 23, 2005 at
the BHSC.
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At the official
opening of the centre on October 19, 2004, the board chairman Brian Todd quoted the late Sir
Winston Churchill Tuesday in describing the status of the centre as
"the end of the beginning".
"Our next phase is recruitment", he said, a sentiment shared by
several speakers during an afternoon of recognition of community
support from thousands of sources and the official unveiling of the
centre's Donor Wall.
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