If a trend to more centralized health care continues, community boards as they exist today may be a thing of the past, as they are in the eastern arctic.
| Health Board budgets (in millions) |
||
| 2000-01 | 2001-02 |
|
| Deh Cho | 9.5 | 10.8 |
| Deninu | 1.2 | 1.2 |
| Dogrib | 5.3 | 5.7 |
| Fort Smith | 8.5 | 9.2 |
| Hay River | 10.2 | 11.8 |
| Inuvik | 34.5 | 38 |
| Lutsel k'e | .9 | 1.0 |
| Stanton | 33 | 36 |
| Yellowknife | 19.3 | 23.8 |
| Total | 122.4 | 137.6 |
Source: Department of Health and Social Services |
||
Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Jun 25/01) - Health boards got some good news last week - more money is coming for most. The news for community health boards this week may not be as palatable.
Four months and $330,000 in the making, a recommended plan for the future of health care in the North will be unveiled today.
| Studies and more
The Cuff Report is the latest in almost $1 million worth of health reports and studies commissioned since the people of the North urged the government to stop studying and start doing. Released last February and commissioned by the previous government, the $450,000 ministers' forum on health care heard from from 900 NWT residents. One clear message was that government is spending too much on studies and not enough on health care. That theme was echoed in the report, which entitled, 'Let's get on with it.' Since it was released, the department of health and social services has spent $963,740 on studies and focus groups. The government spent another $225,000 to host last week's social agenda conference. The Cuff report and a review of departmental information management systems, at $330,000 and $284,000 respectively, were the most expensive of the reports. Health Minister Jane Groenewegen said there is consultation on a variety of health issues and that comes at a cost. |
Shortly after the Nunavut government was established, it seized control of health care from boards created just years before.
A report released in April that will be used as a blueprint for a reorganization of health care in Saskatchewan recommended the number of boards there be reduced to between nine and eleven from the current thirty-two.
Health boards serving communities in the Northwest Territories have had trouble keeping key staff.
In February the CEO of the Fort Smith health board resigned, citing micromanagement by board members. The health department is currently trying to sort out the books of the Deninu Community Health and Social Services Board, which has been unable to find a replacement for its departed CEO.
The road has not been smooth for the largest boards in the territory either. A coroner's inquest earlier this month focused on the death of Effie Blake, a Fort McPherson teacher who fell victim to tuberculosis after being misdiagnosed in Fort McPherson and Inuvik.
Four of the nine boards ran a deficit last year.
Off the Cuff
Back in February, as he was conducting the first of the 300 interviews that went into his report health care in the NWT, George Cuff posed a rhetorical question in discussing the purpose of his study: "Do you need a board for every community, or do you need some sort of advisory mechanism that allows communities to advise regional boards as to the level of service that they need?"
Of the nine boards administering health services today, five are community boards.
"I would be surprised if (the report) doesn't address some of the anomalies in the system," said Health Minister Jane Groenewegen, who emphasized she had neither seen the report or been briefed by Cuff on it.
The whole concept of establishing the boards was to bring decision-making closer to the people the system is designed to serve, said Kelvin Ng, who oversaw establishment of the boards as Health and Social Services Minister in the last government.
Ng, now a cabinet minister in the Nunavut government, said communities and regions initiated the process and the government assessed their requests as they were made.
"For example, Lutsel k'e, they didn't really fit into a regional service area, so it was felt it was more appropriate for them to have their own board," said Ng.
Asked if was decisions were made strictly on cultural or geographic considerations, Ng replied, "cultural or political, when it came right down to it."
The advantages of having a larger service area are clear, said the CEO of the NWT's largest regional health board.
"You need a certain population to be able to provide full-time professional services in a given area," said Ray Scott of the Inuvik Regional Health and Social Services Board said.
"If you don't have the size, you're going to have to contract out."
Deh Cho Health and Social Services Board CEO Kathy Tsetso said, apart from a "mini-crisis" in the nursing ranks, the board has had little trouble retaining full-time professional staff.
"I do know when you break it down into smaller units you lose economies of scale and you lose some of the expertise," said Tsetso.
The public will have until Aug. 1 to comment on the report.
