A1 - Closing Gaps and Providing Health Care to First Nation Communities in North Western Ontario

1. Expanding access to team-based care

  • Date: 2024-10-24
  • Concurrent Session: Concurrent Session A
  • Time: 2:45– 3:30 pm
  • Room:
  • Style: Presentation (information provided to audience, with opportunity for audience to ask question)
  • Focus: Practical (e.g. Presentation on how to implement programs and/or practices in the team environment)
  • Target Audience: Leadership (ED, clinical lead, board chair, board member, etc.)    Clinical providers        Representatives of stakeholder/partner organizations
     

Learning Objectives:

Participants will learn: 

  • To provide the attendees with information on how a Primary Health Care Team can close gaps and reduce barriers to clients in 33 First Nation remote communities.  
  • The attendees will learn the logistics, challenges, and benefits of a team approach to primary health care. 
  • The limited access to health care for our clients will be discussed; we will share how having a travelling team approach to providing heath care has allowed our team to see over 2000 individual clients last year and over 6000 appointments completed either in person or virtually, with these clients living in the North. 

Summary/Abstract:
The presentation will provide the attendees with an overview of our organization, as well as our department/program.  The Mission, Vison and Values will be discussed and how our team approach to health care helps us ensure they are met.      We will discuss the various health professionals on our team and the roles and services that are unique to each.  In addition, the various health concerns of our population will be discussed and how their health has been directly impacted by the social determinants of health and intergenerational trauma.     The focus will be the travelling team approach to health care and how it has allowed us to close gaps, reducing barriers for people living in northern remote communities. The attendees will learn what a travelling team looks like, who is part of the team, where we travel, ways we travel, how we see clients in community, and much more will be disused and answered throughout the presentation.  A gallery of pictures of what it looks like to travel to the North by various means of transportation, specifically small charters airplanes, will be presented.     Moreover, the challenges of recruitment and retention for Northern Organizations such as ours will be discussed. The ways to which we are trying to overcome these challenges will be presented, along with the benefits of working with our program and how working with our team has allowed many team members to achieve a large array of experience and love for working in the North to help our clients.   
 

Presenter:

  • Katie Wantoro    Director     Sioux Lookout First Nations Health Authority