Today the province announced its plans for a “refocused” healthcare delivery system that will see the creation of four separate but “integrated” healthcare organizations.
Alberta Health Services (AHS) currently administers most aspects of health care in the province, but that will change in the coming months.
The new organizations will cover the priority areas of primary care, acute care, continuing care and mental health and addiction.
Alberta Health Services will now have a “primary focus” of acute and continuing care. It will become a service provider, much like Catholic provider Covenant Health, Minister of Health Adriana LaGrange told reporters at a morning press conference.
At the same press conference, Premier Danielle Smith said Alberta's current health system "limits government’s ability to provide system-wide oversight on behalf of the people of Alberta. It also limits our ability to set priorities and require accountability for meeting them."
The new system will “avoid the scattered approach” of the “rigid centralized structure” that currently exists, Smith said.
She said that the changes will create faster and more responsive health care delivery systems and allow for “innovative solutions” as well as create space for “local decision-making and advice.”
The acute care organization will oversee hospital care, urgent care centres, cancer care, clinical operations, surgeries and emergency medical services.
The primary care organization will “coordinate primary health care services and provide transparent provincial oversight,” according to a government press release. It will cover visits to family doctors or nurse practitioners, consultations with specialists, preventative care and chronic disease management.
“The new continuing care provincial organization will provide provincial oversight, coordination, service delivery, home care and community care,” a press release from the province says.
The Ministry of Mental Health and Addiction, introduced late last year, will oversee the new mental health and addiction organization. It will take control of services currently provided by AHS.
Anyone battling addiction or mental health struggles “deserves an opportunity to pursue recovery,” Minister Dan Williams told reporters at a morning press conference.
The new system will roll out in stages over the coming months and years. First will be the organization for continuing care, expected to launch in the spring of 2024, LaGrange said. It will be followed by the launch of the new addictions and mental health organization, with acute and primary care to be unveiled next fall.
LaGrange also named Dr. Lyle Oberg, a minister under both Ralph Klein and Ed Stelmach who later joined the Wildrose Alliance Party, the chair of a new seven-person AHS board tasked with overseeing the transition.
