Brenda Senger, Director, Physician Support Programs
PATIENT’S MEDICAL HOME Drs. Ginger Ruddy and Sarah Bates discuss the Patient’s Medical Home vision for Saskatchewan and the impact of COVID-19.
The SMA recently spoke with Dr. Ginger Ruddy and Dr. Sarah Bates to discuss how the first few months of the COVID-19 pandemic have impacted primary care in Saskatchewan, the robustness of the Patient’s Medical Home (PMH) vision during a pandemic, and the opportunities to advance the PMH model in Saskatchewan. Dr. Ruddy is an assistant professor, Academic Family Medicine and chair of the Saskatchewan College of Family Physicians’ Patient’s Medical Home Committee. Dr. Bates is a family physician and assistant professor, undergraduate director, Academic Family Medicine. Drs. Ruddy and Bates have provided care following the PMH model in other jurisdictions.
The Canadian Medical Association and the College of Family Physicians of Canada heartily endorse the Patient’s Medical Home (PMH) as the future of family medicine in Canada. The PMH is a family practice considered by its patients to be the place they feel most comfortable presenting and discussing their personal and family health and medical concerns. When the PMH vision is fully realized, every family practice will offer the medical care that Canadians want – readily accessible, centred on patients’ needs, provided throughout every stage of life, and seamlessly integrated with other services in the health-care system and the community. The COVID-19 pandemic has, out of necessity, created an environment ripe for advancing many facets of the PMH model: improved access, continuity, connected care, teambased care, funding to support system change and, most critically, patient-centeredness.
SMA DIGEST | FALL 2020
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