Suzanne McGurn, Assistant Deputy Minister of Health Human Resources Strategy Division for the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care addressed our CE Directors, Leaders and Administrators group June 7th at a meeting celebrating the completion of the academic year. She spoke on the Ministry’s future directions and the role of CPD professionals in transforming health care.
Opening remarks were made by Office of CEPD Vice Dean, Dimitri Anastakis and Faculty of Medicine Dean, Catharine Whiteside who emphasized the importance of partnership in the continuum of educating health professionals, “training the trainers” through CEPD with rapidly changing curriculum focused on community-based health care, enabling the University of Toronto to be a leader in interprofessional education in Canada and across the globe.
Ms. McGurn echoed these sentiments commenting on the speed of healthcare innovation and how we in CEPD can translate that innovation into change “on the ground” by visualizing where we want to be in the future, rather than looking backwards. CEPD can help transform health care by training doctors to see past their old patterns to adopt new practices and by engaging U of T alumni as lifelong learners. She said that the Ministry’s new initiative can be described as “right care, right time, right place” building on the “Excellent Care for All Act” and the “Open Ontario” agenda. Aligning education with transformation in community hospitals and clinical settings, harnessing innovation and translating new information out into the healthcare sector within five years are key objectives. In closing Ms. McGurn asked, “What change could we make if we harnessed all the CE departments on one street and focused on the same issue?” Envision local change with global impact.
