While it’s not the answer she was looking for, Public General Hospital acting board chair Jane Havens said she isn’t diheartened with the province’s decision not to dissolve the Chatham Kent Health Alliance agreement.
Late last week the PGH and St. Joseph’s boards sought provincial approval to dissolve the agreement due to ongoing issues with the Sydenham District Hospital board.
Havens today acknowledged receipt of a letter from Dr. Bob Bell, Deputy Minister of Health, to the Public General Hospital Society (PGH) and St. Josephs Healthcare Services of Chatham (SJH) rejecting their application to dissolve the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance.
She said in the letter, which remains confidential, the deputy minister used the phrase “at this time” regarding the prospects of dissolution.
“It wasn’t a resounding no,” she said. “The ministry has acknowledged the problems are real and long-standing and require immediate attention.”
She said the best-case scenario would be dissolution of the agreement but is prepared to follow the ministry’s instructions to be patient.
“These issues have been on their radar for two years,” she said. “It appears they have gotten the message and we realize it is totally in the hands of the ministry and the LHIN (Erie-St. Clair Local Health Integration Network) and the decisions will be made at that level.”
Sheldon Parsons, chair of the SDH board, released a statement last night calling the letter “welcome news.
“We have been advocating that agenda from the day that the two Chatham boards announced publicly that they were suspending all alliance governance activities and privatley that they were seeking to dissolve the Alliance.”
“We were not informed by PGH and SJH of their application to the Ministry, so it came as a surprise to us when we received the letter,” the release continued. “Not the first surprise from them, but it should be the last, if the two Chatham boards follow the advice of the Ministry.”
Parsons quoted a portion of the deputy minister’s letter requesting “all parties to continue to act in good faith and use best efforts to explore go-forward options that do not involve the unwinding of the Alliance and termination of the agreement.”
SDH will communicate with the deputy minister accepting his direction. “We agree that the interest of patients, residents and visitors of both Chatham-Kent and Sydenham-Walpole-St. Clair are best served by the boards responsible for the governance of their health-care services, when they co-operate with each other.”
Cooperation can be a very good thing if people decide working together as a team, with and for each other is easily attainable. The problem is are they willing to try?