Day TWO: Together in Excellence - Leaders in Healthcare

Dropping off donations to the TLC team

What a change healthcare in Niagara has seen over the last couple of years! 

Since the St.Catharines NHS Site has opened, thousands of patients have benefitted from new and expanded regional services that brought care closer to home in a state-of-the-art-facility. 

We partnered with the NHS to donate colouring books, crayons, candy canes and toys to the Children's Unit. The unit is specifically designed for younger patients and their families, with vibrant colours, a play room, artwork on the walls, special lighting, a family apartment suite, a family lounge and other unique features. We hope the toys and activity books will help comfort the children and brighten their day while they are in the hospital, especially those that are spending the holidays there. Bringing the donations to the charities is the most rewarding part, today we donated over 95 children's items to the NHS!




I think the proof of their impact is in the facts:

• For the first time in Niagara, residents of the peninsula had access to a full spectrum of cancer care including radiation therapy through the hospital’s Walker Family Cancer Centre. 7,600 radiation treatments were provided to 700 patients.

• Almost 1,300 cardiac care patients were able to receive diagnostic procedures at the Heart Investigation Unit (HIU). The opening of the HIU has meant access to cardiac catheterization, and as of April 2014, interventional care (stents) for the first time in the region.

• Approximately 2,700 babies have been born at the St. Catharines Site new regional Women’s and Babies’ Unit. The patients and specialized team in this program have benefited from being in one location with the availability of concentrated expertise and training, and a multidisciplinary environment.   

• The Mental Health and Addictions Program has started seven new programs, hired 105 new staff members, and recruited seven new psychiatrists with an additional four to join the team in 2014. The availability of new longer-term mental health care has meant that many patients and families no longer have to travel outside the region for care.

• The Kidney Care Program has expanded its care model to include a community-based satellite Kidney Care Centre in Niagara Falls; the first of its kind in the region. The Niagara Falls program has provided 15,400 treatments to 80 patients. NHS now provides dialysis across the region; in Welland, St. Catharines, and Niagara Falls. 

• The NHS’s Niagara District Stroke Centre at the Greater Niagara General Site continues to have the best “door-to-needle time” (the amount of time patients wait to receive life-saving t-PA) in the province at an average of 31 minutes.

• The Welland Site opened a Respirology Clinic and has been building a regional Comprehensive General Ambulatory Ophthalmology Program. The program has performed 5,600 cataract surgeries and had patient 2,200 visits.

• The Douglas Memorial, Niagara-on-the-Lake, and Fort Erie sites have focused on building improved specialized complex and palliative care services.

The NHS is always looking for volunteers, especially in the Emergency Department to escort children and parents to children's surgeries and for pre-natal tours. If you are interested in a rewarding experience giving back in our community, check out http://www.niagarahealth.on.ca/en/volunteer-resources

"At the end of the day it's not about what you have or even what you've accomplished... it's about who you've lifted up, who you've made better. It's about what you've given back." 

- Denzel Washington