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LHINs to decide which surgeries should be moved from hospitals

Health Minister Deb Matthews signalled that the LHINs would decide which surgeries and tests should be shifted from hospitals to clinics, the Ottawa Citizen reports.  "We will expect the LHINs to do the work to determine what, if any, procedures there are that could be better delivered in the community," Matthews said.


Moving work out of hospitals is a major policy direction for the Ontario Liberal government.


LHINs are, of course, supposed to integrate health care (their full name is Local Health Integration Network) so it is amusing that they are now supposed to fragment health care by moving work to new providers.  (Oh what a tangled web we weave...)


The Citizen also reports Matthews hinted that she would be open to having the Ottawa Hospital's cataract clinic spun off as a stand-alone corporation, if health officials can demonstrate that such a move "would provide high-quality care at a lower price."  Currently, the Ottawa Hospital clinic provides all cataract surgeries in the area. 
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  1. AnonymousMarch 29, 2012 at 4:58 PM

    This makes sense, hospitals should be used for things that you require the conditions only available in a hospital. If something can be done outside of that setting, it makes sense to do so given the costs to run a facility as complex as a hospital. We no longer need surgery to cure ulcers, or days of recovery after most surgeries. Centralize some services so that the primary services of a hospital are better utilized, while putting services that can be completed in the community in environments lest costly to run and maintain. The liberals do need to stop using the LHINs as a PR tool and let them function as a crown corporation independent of political manipulation (or at least as much as one can expect)

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