Happy anniversary to us! – Unity Health Toronto: Providence Healthcare, St. Joseph's Health Centre and St. Michael's Hospital

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Aug. 1, 2018

Today marks an important milestone in our collective history – one year ago today, we officially became a single health network when the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care approved our integration proposal.

Providence, St. Joseph’s and St. Michael’s came together with a shared purpose to advance the health of our patients, clients and residents, and our respective communities, as well as enhance the broader health system.

In the past year, we’ve made some great progress towards integrating and becoming a single health network.

We successfully moved to a single governance and management model. When we embarked on our journey, we had three boards of directors and three executive teams. We now have one Board of Directors, made of up of a mix of former directors, and we are in the process of recruiting two new directors who will help guide the future of our health network.

We also have a strong team of administrative and clinical leaders across the sites who are dedicated to ensuring our network’s core business – caring for our patients, residents and clients – remains our top priority. They do this by working with their teams to achieve our objectives and by supporting our staff in the work that they do. And we do this in partnership with our three foundations who are so important to enhancing our ability to invest in state-of-the-art equipment, infrastructure renewal and academic programs.

What guides us is our emphasis on excellence in compassionate care. Our first network-wide Quality Improvement Plan is an example of our shared commitment to put patients and their families at the centre of what we do. The plan sets out goals for our three sites, and it identifies measurable steps we will take over the next year to improve patient and resident experience and create a safer environment to deliver care.

We are currently in the midst of developing a harmonized set of mission and values statements using the common strengths we see in the legacy of our founders, the Sisters of St. Joseph. This important work is foundational for our new network. I truly hope you will attend the Mission and Values Café event at your site today – your input is so important to our future.

Looking ahead, I’m excited to be launching our strategic planning process. Again, this will be a first for the network and will establish a unifying vision to guide us into the future.

I’m incredibly inspired by the enormous potential of our organization, and I look forward to working with all of our partners in our shared purpose to advance the health of those we serve and to make a positive difference in Canadian health care.

Happy anniversary!
Tim