FP Lead: Dr. Preena Sahota

 

In April of 2024, the Surrey-North Delta Division of Family Practice showcased eight health system enhancement initiatives that we and our partners have been undertaking in our community. These are the stories behind the storyboards.  

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It’s no secret that patients in BC are having a hard time finding a family doctor or nurse practitioner. As BC’s second-largest municipality, Surrey’s population is nearly as large as Vancouver’s - and growing more quickly – but has roughly one-third the number of practicing family physicians.  

During the discovery process for the creation of our Primary Care Network (PCN), the Surrey-North Delta (SND) Division of Family Practice and our partners identified an attachment gap in our community of 120,000 people, with 80,000 people actively looking for a Family Physician or Nurse Practitioner.   

This has led to extended wait times for patients seeking a primary care provider and to significant barriers to equitable access to health care for a large portion of SND’s diverse and complex population. 

This is where the SND PCN patient attachment program comes in. Through a variety of initiatives, including use of the Health Connect Registry, the creation of two separate attachment streams, and the ongoing work of relationship-building and process improvement, our attachment team has made a significant dent in our community’s attachment gap.  

In its first year of implementation, the SND PCN attached over 26,000 patients, improving health outcomes and access for thousands.  

Attachment Coordinators, Nadia Shoukat and Monica Khan, along with project manager Christopher Pinske, offer a behind-the-scenes look at this complex undertaking. 

--> Want to learn more? See our storyboard HERE.

 

What have been the highlights of working on this initiative? 

Bridging the attachment gap in the community is an obvious highlight - helping patients get attached to healthcare providers.  To date, SND has attached over 28,000 patients in the community.  

Seeing the impact we’ve had thus far in attaching patients really highlights for us how important this work is. We hear personal stories all the time of people who were looking for a physician for years, and they've finally found one with the support of the SND PCN attachment initiative.

Why do you feel that the work being done here is important? What is the impact you’re hoping it will have for physicians? For patients? 

This initiative bridges the gap between physicians looking for patients, and patients searching for a family doctor. By centralizing our efforts, these connections can be made much more efficiently and successfully.  

Physicians working with the SND attachment team are able to quickly build a balanced panel. 

For patients, the attachment initiative is important as every patient should have access to a primary healthcare provider for their medical needs. Studies have shown that having a family doctor leads to better health outcomes for patients. And patients know this, but it has been a long journey for many to find that provider. 

How has member participation contributed to this project’s success? 

Family Physician members have been a key element in building a successful system for attachment. In fact, this initiative has been guided for the past two years by a working group made up of our physician members. 

We also have great participation from FPs, NPs and MOAs supporting us, which has led to the success we have seen in terms of attachment. We depend on our FPs and NPs for attachment in a direct manner, so we are in constant contact with them.  

What’s next for this work? 

Successful and sustainable attachment in our community will depend on a number of factors. We will need to continue to attract new physicians to the community, which is work being undertaken by our R3W committee. We aim to establish a continuous cycle process to improve our attachment operations and make them more efficient, to obtain even better attachment results.   

And of course, we will continue to facilitate attachments and identify FPs and NPs who are looking to attach. 

How can members get involved? 

Members can get involved by contacting our Attachment Coordinators at attachment@snddivision.ca to gain a better understanding of the attachment process and to let us know when they are looking to attach more patients.