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Our Story

The Durham Ontario Health Team (OHT) is a collaborative group of organizations and patient, family and care partner advisors working in partnership to improve access and delivery of coordinated health services. The group is comprised of partners from across the care continuum, including primary care providers, hospitals, mental health and addiction services, social support services, home and community care support services and long-term care.

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The Ministry of Health (MOH) announced the province’s first OHTs in December 2020. The Durham OHT was among this group.

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While the core Durham OHT partnership group is comprised of 18 signatory organizations, there is broad support from more than 70 health care partners across Durham Region, representing various organizations in the health, social, education, and private sectors.

Our Structure

The Durham OHT’s Governance structure continues to foster a culture of trust grounded in inclusion and distributed leadership. Since inception, our partners worked diligently on the evolution of our decision making framework and governance model to better align with and support our current priorities and areas of focus, and successfully landed on the next iteration of the Durham OHT Governance structure. This included creating the Executive Leadership Table (ELT) and transforming the Durham OHT Collaboration Council to the Durham OHT Partnership, Innovation and Strategic Forum.  As we continue to elevate our structures and governance model, the Durham OHT strives to build a regional and integrated care inclusive of sector representation from across the continuum of care. 

The Durham Ontario Health Team Executive Leadership Table (ELT) is responsible for developing and overseeing the implementation of the Durham Ontario Health Team’s (Durham OHT) annual operational work plans.  These duties include:

  • Reviewing and approving decisions related to the allocation and sharing of costs and resources, including funding earmarked for the Durham OHT including but not limited to human resources, capital, facilities, and costs related to supporting the work of the Durham OHT;

  • Leading formal and informal consultation activities with members of the Durham OHT Sector Network Tables, Collaboration Council and other relevant key stakeholder groups as part of the ELT’s review and approval process;

  • Providing Executive Sponsor level support to the Durham OHT Strategic Implementation Lead;

A coalition of partners that is committed to a common set of principles and goals to improve health and wellness across Durham.  We are committed to achieving those goals through engagement and partnering with patients/clients, families, and care partners and each other.  

Lead work focused on strengthening Durham OHT Partner Engagement and enhancing engagement with local communities to inform planning and build awareness of Durham OHT work.

The Digital Health & Data Governance Working Group is responsible for overseeing the execution of the Harmonized Information Management Plan and set priorities and direction in the OHT’s digital health initiatives, data governance and analytical capabilities. As an action-oriented committee, members are expected to develop, resource and execute project plans which include:

  • Ensuring information management initiatives align with overall organization goals

  • Legal requirements are met when information and data is shared among stakeholders,

  • Standards of information protection and ethical practices are consistently observed on OHT Projects, and

  • A consistent and meaningful view of the data is provided to other OHT working groups and committees.is the Digital

The Durham Ontario Health Team (Durham OHT) Regional Patient, Family and Care Partner Advisory Council (PFCPAC) will works in collaboration with Durham OHT partners to ensure that engagement, partnering and co-design with patients, families and care partners are embedded in all Durham OHT activities in order to improve the system of health and social care and support for Durham Region residents.

The Durham OHT Performance and Evaluation Committee is focused on supporting the translation of system, provincial level goals related to performance measurement, quality and evaluation to our local Durham region context.  This includes:

  • Collaborating with both Durham Service provider organizations, supporting Quality and Performance networks (i.e. HSPN, RISE) and  equivalent committees in other OHTs in the development of a larger system performance framework for OHT-Durham including but not limited to the identification of shared quality improvement objectives and the development of Collaborative Quality Improvement Plans (QIPs)

  • Supporting the monitoring and evaluation of existing OHT funded initiatives and the performance and evaluation frameworks of new initiatives to assist in ensuring progress in improving quality of care for target OHT priority populations

  • Providing oversight to quarterly performance data submissions to Ontario Health

The Durham Ontario Health Team (OHT) is comprised of partners representing the full continuum of care and includes patient/client, family, and care partner representation. These partners range from health and social services to local municipalities and beyond, with an interest and commitment to designing and delivering an integrated health and social care system for residents of Durham region. Ensuring primary care is at the core of the OHT requires a dedicated primary care advisory council.

 

The Durham OHT Primary Care Advisory Council (PCAC) is responsible for developing recommendations for the integration of primary care into the Durham OHT, recommendations for improving access to care, integration of care and improved resources to patients and providers.

Our Projects

The Omicron variant had a significant impact on the volumes in the emergency departments in Durham Region which brought together a working group in late December 2021. The COVID-19 Response Working Group focused on the rapid implementation of strategic initiatives to support system planning by working collaboratively to advance Emergency Department Diversion initiatives across the Lakeridge Health System. To assist with ensuring continued access to acute care hospital services during the fifth wave, a communication strategy was developed and an urgent Call to Action was initiated resulting in expanded community-based primary care clinic hours and increased access to virtual care. The Durham Ontario Health Team hosted its first Virtual Community Town Hall meeting on January 20, 2022. The event provided an opportunity for Durham Region residents to connect with primary care leaders to address questions and concerns regarding wave five of the pandemic in addition to sharing key messages related to accessing care. Over 658 people joined the event live and 3,327 attendees participated virtually. The OHT also hosted several professional development webinars that were focused on ED Diversion, our Durham Region’s Integrated COVID-19 Response and the Introduction of Antiviral Treatment Paxlovid. 

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