Sunnybrook Management Commentary and Analysis 2014/15

elated clinical training organized by the
World Health Organization for clinicians
and Ministry of Health personnel from
10 at-risk sub-Saharan Africa countries.
Dr. Rob Fowler served as a Consultant
to the World Health Organization during
the ongoing West Africa disease outbreak
and helped to develop Public Health
Agency of Canada guidelines on the care
of patients with Ebola.
Mackenzie Health and Sunnybrook optimize quality care
The Hospital expanded and formalized
its relationship with Mackenzie Health
to improve access to high quality health
care services for patients in York Region
and beyond. The partnership is reducing
duplication and improving health system
capacity by using the program strengths
of each organization. The collaboration
has created a corridor of care for referral
and repatriation for highly specialized
tertiary and quaternary services needed
by the residents of York Region, at
the same time exploring opportunities
for enhanced research and teaching
activities between the organizations.
Automated physician notifications improved communication
A new system was launched focused
on accurate physician information in the
Patient Care System (PCS), considered
critical for timely information sharing. The
initiative focuses on improving physician
contact information and reducing errors
when manually entering information
into PCS. The solution uses a patient
self check-in approach with pre-coded
registration cards containing physician
and patient registration information to
automatically populate PCS. The new
approach is convenient for patients and
easy to navigate.
Ensuring a seamless and timely transfer of patients
Extracorporeal life support is a type of
cardiopulmonary bypass that supports
the lungs, heart, or both in patients
in intensive care with reversible lifethreatening
respiratory or cardiac
disease. In 2014/15, Sunnybrook
launched a collaboration with University
Health Network to provide access to
extracorporeal life support and ventricular
assist device programs for the Hospital’s
patients. A ventricular assist device is
a mechanical heart pump that can
be implemented inside or outside the
chest to provide support for the heart
as it recovers from injury or until heart
transplant. Patients requiring care will be
transferred to Toronto General Hospital,
a hospital site that has developed
considerable expertise in managing these
patients.
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