Giroux 'optimistic' about 2019 after year of cuts at Health Sciences North

"2018 was challenging."

"It was tough from that perspective especially for frontline staff," he said.

Coming in 2019 for Health Sciences North:

• New private donations to the hospital
• February: Strategic Plan
• March: Finishing electronic medical records for all 25 hospitals in Northeastern Ontario
• May: Capital Master Plan

Planning for the future

Health Sciences North is focusing on developing a new strategic plan and capital plan for the hospital looking forward to the next several years.

Giroux acknowledges attempts to create a one-site hospital hasn't been achieved, with Health Sciences North occupying 13 different properties across Greater Sudbury. He says the capital plan will look to consolidate the real estate footprint to focus on delivering more services in a cost-effective manner.

"We want to reduce our number of sites. We want to create more bed spaces. We want to create more space for mental health and addictions," he said.

"We want to create more space to allow for more programming for kids and youth to be delivered here in the regions so that young patients don't have to leave the region as much for care."

Giroux added that HSN's capital master plan will articulate the physical footprint needed for the next 20 years.

Capacity problems #1 priority for hospital

Data obtained by CBC News shows over a period from April to November 2018, Health Sciences North is at or over capacity 92% of the time.

Giroux says when he was appointed to the position over a year ago, he was told by the hospital board, solving the alternate level of care situation is priority number one.

"It was on average about a hundred [ALC] patients a day in 2017," said Giroux.

As a result Health Sciences North began a weekly working group with the North East Local Health Integration Network. Giroux says the regular meetings made the issue "visible" and ultimately resulted in a positive momentum.

"The target we set at HSN and jointly with the LHIN to contain a number of agency patients is below 75 and within that number to have fewer than 25 ELC patients waiting for long term care."

As it stands, there are approximately 86 ALC patients waiting to transfer to long term care beds or returning to their homes with proper homecare supports.

The North East LHIN says it's working with hospitals across the region to reduce the pressures on the acute care system.

"We continue to work with our four large urban hospitals and several community hospitals to implement the Alternate Level of Care (ALC) Avoidance Framework. It provides a road map of ALC avoidance strategies that have been shown to be effective for hospital teams who are working to get their patients to the right place of care," a spokesperson for the organization told CBC Sudbury.

For the NDP's Health Care critic and Sudbury area MPP, France Gelinas, the ongoing capacity issues are simply not acceptable.

"It is awful," she said. "Hospitals cannot provide quality care when it is full at 100 percent when every stretcher in E.R. when every patient lounge TV rooms hallway is full. It is impossible."

Giroux says he's accelerating plans to add more beds in the short term, and is developing hospital policies to fall in line with the provincial government's priorities for the health care sector.