The Chatham-Kent Health Coalition along with the Ontario Health Coalition are seeking some feedback from the community about their healthcare needs.
“We want to make sure that the needed and wanted health care services are available to local communities,” said Shirley Roebuck, chair of the Chatham-Kent Health Coalition. “By that I mean, that they are offered locally.”
Roebuck said she has asked the Erie-St. Clair Local Health Integration Network (LHIN) for some background information.
“I asked them on July 23 and to date I have received nothing,” she said. “I’m sure that they have work to do to gather the information, but still it is a pretty long time.”
Roebuck said her and Natalie Mehra, chair of the Ontario Health Coalition, will be interviewing various stakeholder groups and healthcare users on Wednesday, September 17 at Knox Presbyterian Church in Wallaceburg.
Roebuck said she is encouraging people to contact her to arrange a time to conduct the interview on the 17th.
“We want to interview stakeholder groups or healthcare users about what the people see as their healthcare priorities in this area are,” she said. “It’s very good for people to have studies and background information and statistics, but until you speak to the people you’re not going to really know what they feel are needed services and what they perceive to be gaps in services. That is very important when our healthcare system is being drastically overhauled by our provincial government and so many services are being moved out of hospitals.”
Roebuck added: “What Natalie Mehra and I are going to do, with the public’s help is to interview groups, interview people and see what they think about the healthcare services that they are receiving and if they are adequate, if they are over extended, if they are not available, if the wait lists are too long.”
Roebuck said they are hoping to interview senior citizens, retirees along with people “dealing and coping with chronic disease and especially we would like to speak with diabetics and those were are dealing with other chronic diseases, such as congestive heart failure.
“Those are the three things we’re really looking at right now. I’m also going to ask representatives from Walpole Island First Nations to attend. I hope they will share with us what they perceive to be the gaps in services,” she said.
Contact Roebuck by phone at 519-677-4460 or e-mail at shirl@xcelco.on.ca.
