Shared on behalf of Dr. Rhonda Crocker Ellacott, President & CEO, TBRHSC and CEO, TBRHRI

Hello, Boozhou, Bonjour!

I wanted to touch base quickly to bring you up to speed on a busy summer at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre as we head into the fall season. This past month in particular has been a hectic one for our teams. We are seeing an uptick in patients being admitted including higher volumes of ED visits with complicated medical issues.

Across the board, departments including ICU, paediatrics, surgery, medicine, emergency, psychiatry, radiology, pathology — just everyone — has stepped up to maintain services. Fortunately, the significant contributions of the Hospitalist program has as well, resulting in us being able to manage the increased pressures on our organization. You may not be aware, but our Hospitalists take care of a substantial share of inpatients, and often care for the patients with the most complex social needs. Hospitalists are an important part of patient care, and their practices directly contribute to better patient outcomes. We appreciate the work of the Hospitalists and all our care teams in providing safe, patient-centred care and improving flow, so patients get timely care. Congratulations to Dr. Moh Bassuony and his team for their work. We look forward to more great things in the future as the Hospitalist program evolves into a fully-fledged teaching unit as part of our Academic Hospital Model. 

So, with that overview, know that working with our care teams, we have managed to achieve a dramatic reduction in patients’ length of stay. This has significantly contributed to our ability to create capacity within our Hospital and support hospital-wide patient flow strategies, despite the enormous pressures on the organization. Through the expertise of so many talented staff/professional staff, we are able to support the safest transitions in care within our Hospital, and to and from the communities. 

On August 14th, we were pleased to have the Honourable Minister Tibollo, Associate Minister of Mental Health and Addictions for Ontario in the city. The visit provided an opportunity for a roundtable with many health care providers to discuss the crisis and gain perspectives on addressing the issues. We know there is an urgent and immediate need for safe sobering and withdrawal management services within our community.

As well, we communicated a need to have the appropriate environments and staffing models to provide coordinated care that is accessible to anyone needing it. We appreciate the work being done with many of our partners and we are hopeful that there will be further services in our area. 

As part of the Staff Advisory Committee suggestions, this month we had food trucks on site to supplement the food options for when the cafeteria is not available for hot meals. We thought we would try this out and we hope this alternative reflected well on staff experience. As a reminder, your Staff Advisory Committee is available to support and develop the culture of our Hospital and Health Research Institute community. The group is available to ensure the broader voice is heard and staff and patient experience continues to thrive. Representatives can be found here.

Finally, as summer begins to wind down and you enter the busy month of September with family activities and such, I truly hope you were able to take some time for yourself this summer to recharge your batteries physically and mentally. Even though the pandemic has been declared over, the fact is that the past three years have been a grind for all of you and we are still extremely busy here at the Hospital. It is imperative that you keep tabs on your health and well-being moving forward. If you are struggling, please consider tapping into the resources available to support you.

I hope you find these blogs of value and as always, please feel free to reach out to me with comments or for any other matter. You can reach me at: rhonda.ellacott@tbh.net.