A research team from RCCbc and UNBC (Division of Medical Sciences) have been given a significant funding boost from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) to look at how “hybrid care” could be used to improve healthcare workforce sustainability and health equity.
In this case “hybrid care” refers to a mix of in-person and virtual care.
The total grant of $745,056 over three years is funded in partnership between CIHR’s Institute of Health Services and Policy Research (IHSPR) and Michael Smith Health Research BC.
The hope is that the learnings will be able to be applied to developing service delivery guidelines and hybrid care policy scalable across Canada.
The principal investigator for the research will be UBC Northern Medical program’s Dr. Anurag Singh (also affiliated with UNBC). He said: “This project will promote health equity in rural communities by building trust between communities and health providers and co-creating and implementing virtual care solutions.”
The other members of the research team include Dr. Ray Markham, RCCbc’s executive director, Dr. John Pawlovich, RCCbc’s virtual health lead, Dr. Nelly Oelke, RCCbc’s co-scientific director, Dr. Kendall Ho, the head of UBC’s Digital Emergency Medicine team, and John Mah, First Nations Health Authority’s vice president of health benefits and services.
“This project will promote health equity in rural communities by building trust between communities and health providers and co-creating and implementing virtual care solutions.”
The researchers are looking at how hybrid care programs:
- link health professionals through technology to treat patients (virtual care) alongside local providers (in-person care)
- bridge service gaps when providers are unavailable and;
- support local providers.
Because not all communities have embraced such programs, the researchers are seeking to understand the complexities of implementing ‘hybrid care’ and how to make this approach culturally safe and adaptable to unique community needs, while improving healthcare workforce sustainability.
A total of $11.6 million in funding was announced by the Government of Canada as part of efforts to bolster ways of strengthening and supporting Canada’s health workforce.
These investments will inform retention and recruitment practices, support the mobility of physicians across Canada to help communities facing shortages, and investigate solutions to strengthen the health workforce and positively impact policy and practice.
