650 Main St.
Winnipeg, Manitoba
R3B 1E2 CANADA

650, rue Main
Winnipeg (Manitoba)
R3B 1E2 CANADA

TEL: 204  926.7000
FAX: 204  926-7007
www.wrha.mb.ca

TEL: 204  926.7000
TELEC: 204  926-7007
www.wrha.mb.ca

MEMO
Date:

April 7, 2017

To:

All Staff

Subject:

Healing our Health System – A Plan for Better Patient Care

From:

Milton Sussman
President & CEO

Today we publicly announced our regional plan for improving patient care across our
system. I am pleased to also share it with you.
This plan is intended to capitalize on our strengths as a health region, position our sites
to deliver improved health care services, and to secure them into the future. This work
represents the biggest transformation of our health system in decades. And while this
change is clearly significant, it forms a needed framework for health care delivery that
manages our resources, both human and financial, in ways that provide the right care in
the right place at the right time.
For some time, and despite the dedicated efforts of staff committed to the provision of
quality service, the health care system in Winnipeg has been confusing and, at times,
ineffective: too many people wait too long for the right care, or endure what are at times
multiple transfers between sites to obtain it. This has impacted the well-being of our
community and the sustainability of our health care system.
So we’re undertaking important changes to refocus our services and enhance the care we
provide our patients.
This includes reviewing what types of services are in place at each site. We realized
that in many ways we’re an outlier compared to other cities in Canada. We have more
emergency departments than they do and yet our performance relative to wait times and
lengths of stay is poor.
Instead of spreading emergency and urgent care services thinly across seven sites —
we’re concentrating emergency services at three locations (Health Sciences Centre, St.
Boniface Hospital and Grace Hospital), and urgent care at two (Seven Oaks General
Hospital and Victoria General Hospital).
And we’re grouping specialized services (e.g. mental health services, day surgery,
transitional care, etc.) staff and equipment at each site to help us do a better job of
serving the patients who need us most – particularly the elderly.

 We’re also working to ensure we manage services like laundry, food, management and
purchasing in a more cost-effective and sustainable way.
Our plan will create environments for care where staff are resourced to perform at their
full scope of practice and where patients can obtain access to what they need when they
need it.
By establishing clear roles for sites across the region we will better anticipate and
respond to staffing requirements while building a critical mass of expertise that permits
our people to be creative and innovative, optimizing care and the processes that support
it.
Keep in mind that these changes will not happen overnight. Some staff movement and
system transformation will occur as early as this summer, while other moves will take
longer to implement. We have set a 12-24 month time frame for completion. We are
committed to communicating in advance with you and our community before changes
occur.
Our plan includes implementation of a 15 per cent reduction in the number of nonunionized managers mandated by the province. In terms of direct care and other front
line staff, we are confident that we will ultimately be able to provide a job for any direct
care staff member who wants to remain in the health system within Winnipeg.
Additional details of the plan can be found at our new intranet page, Focus on
Improvement. You can find it as a link on the Insite page. We have also launched a
public-facing web page today at www.healingourhealthsystem.ca where addition
information can be found. We will update these sites regularly with information as these
changes are implemented.
A public education campaign will also be launched in the coming days to ensure our
community is aware of and understands the changes before they occur.
I encourage you to take a few moments to watch the video below to hear more about my
thoughts on this important plan.
http://home.wrha.mb.ca/improvement/healing-video-01.php

As staff in the region, I look forward to your participation in this process and to your
ongoing support as we jointly strive to ensure the health system is equipped to meet the
needs of patients today and into the future.
I will travel around the region in the days and weeks ahead to provide further details
around the impact on your site and region as a whole.
I know there will be many more questions to come, and we are committed to answering
them as fully as possible, as early as possible.
Sincerely,
Milton Sussman