Team-based Care (TBC)
DEFINED AS:
“BC is working to increase people’s access to primary care by introducing a team-based care approach to primary care. This is being done through patient medical homes in family practices, primary care networks in the community, and the urgent and primary care centres across BC.
Within a team-based model of care, multiple health care providers from different professional backgrounds work together and with patients/clients, families, caregivers, and communities to deliver comprehensive health services across care settings. Effective teamwork is a critical enabler of safe, high quality care and supports a patient's ongoing relationship with their primary care provider (a family physician or nurse practitioner). Teams broaden the availability of clinical supports for patients and for family doctors.” (1)
Government Says:
“For people and families, it means getting faster, better access to their primary care team or provider, including evenings and weekends, as well as being connected to appropriate services and supports in the community.
Over the next years, (written in 2020) these new networks are expected to help connect approximately 300,000 people to a local primary care team or provider, while providing team-based and culturally safe care to B.C. residents. ”(2)
Our questions are:
Have new networks attached 300,000 people as expected?
Have Primary Care Networks helped create new TBC in communities? If so, how many new TBC clinics exist?
Have Primary Care Networks provided “faster, better access to primary care teams”?
We agree Team Based Care is the way of the future and appears to provide a better care model for patients as well as a better working model for care teams. But, if the organizations and processes in BC are not achieving the goals they outlined for developing TBC then it is time to reassess the system.
