About us
Ontario’s ehealth strategy
On March 19, 2009, eHealth Ontario released Ontario’s eHealth Strategy.The strategy focuses on three clinical priorities over the next three years:
- Diabetes Management:
to control and manage diabetes more effectively and reduce associated complications and costs. - Medication Management:
to implement on-line management of prescription medications to minimize preventable adverse drug events. - Wait Times:
to reduce waits in Ontario emergency departments and the incidence of inpatients in acute care waiting for alternate levels of care, and to continue improving wait times for acute care services.
The eHealth Strategy 2009-2012 is grounded in the vision of the agency: Achieving excellence in health care by harnessing the power of information. The Strategy was informed by guiding principles centered on patient-focus, tangible clinical impact, clinically relevant solutions, transparency, active engagement of communities and experts, collaboration and partnerships, effective and efficient use of resources, performance improvements, and public accountability.
eHealth Ontario is committed to successfully executing the Strategy and being held accountable for meeting its priorities on time and on budget. eHealth Ontario will remain focused and achieve its goals with commitment and conviction. We look forward to working with the public, clinicians and others to make this Strategy a success. eHealth Ontario especially looks forward to improving health care and empowering Ontarians to be more engaged in their health care through information.
Some of the specific ways patients will benefit from eHealth:
- Receive reminders about tests, treatments or medication needs
- Receive information about their condition with practical steps to improve care
- See that their primary care provider and emergency department have access to their medication list
- Use the Internet for health needs, e.g. put in a request for prescription refills online, see their diabetes information and track how well they are doing, see Emergency Department wait times at all Ontario hospitals
- Experience shorter wait times in hospital emergency departments and for beds in other settings, e.g. acute care, long-term care
Report of the Consultations
A draft strategy was released in January and over 400 individuals or organizations responded with feedback either through meetings or written submissions. The feedback was overwhelmingly supportive and was used to refine the Strategy.