Right-Sizing Children’s Healthcare Systems
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Children’s Healthcare Canada is on a mission to “right-size” health systems serving children and youth.
From coast to coast to coast, and across the continuum of care, children, youth and their families are experiencing long and costly delays for essential and time sensitive healthcare services. In many jurisdictions, children are now waiting longer for these services than adults.
A growing body of evidence underscores the impacts associated with decades of underinvestment in children’s health. As a wealthy nation, Canada has all the resources necessary to meaningfully and measurably improve children’s health and wellbeing, but what will it take? And, where should we prioritize investments to yield greatest impact?
What is a right-sized children's healthcare system?
It is an accessible, equitable, connected healthcare system designed for the needs of children, youth and families.
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Beyond Bandaids: Town Hall
We are inviting our members and partners to a Townhall meeting where we will be presenting the outcome of our right-sizing work and the recommendations we are putting forward. We have taken all the feedback received in the last two years, and developed concrete recommendations to create sustainability in the system, improve health outcomes and to guide policy and advocacy efforts and investments in child health in Canada.
We know better is possible. Canada is a wealthy country with all the resources necessary to improve children’s health outcomes. By mobilizing strategic partnerships from all levels of government, advocacy, and the health sector, coordinating the deployment of new resources with a focus on children’s health, and creating leadership for change, we can move beyond bandaid solutions to create healthcare systems fit for kids.
Sign up to one of our three Town Hall meetings below.
No Child Elects to Wait, finds that overdrawn timelines add significantly to healthcare system costs, and negatively impact children’s health outcomes. This research initiative, begins by delving into the complexities of wait times and backlogs for pediatric surgery in Canada, exploring their underlying causes and evidence-based consequences
Nurturing Minds for Secure Futures, explores the crisis in access to mental healthcare prevention, assessment, diagnoses, and treatment services for children and youth. We quantify the evidence-informed consequences of not investing today to ensure timely access to mental health services and supports for current and future generations of Canada’s children and youth.
Our vision is clear: Children, youth and their families will have timely, simple access to an integrated system of the health services and benefits, flexible to each family’s needs that enables the best possible health outcomes.
Children’s Healthcare Canada, working alongside our members and with partners, facilitated a series of consultations to identify gaps in the child health system and define key priorities aligned with the vision of achieving right-sized, integrated health systems for children and youth in Canada.
Thank you to the Canadian Pediatric Society, Canadian Association of Pediatric Nurses, Pediatric Chairs of Canada and families with lived experience for your participation and support.
These interactive consultations were held virtually between October and November 2023 and focused on five key areas where recommendations for policy and investment will make the greatest impact.
The key areas included:
- Access to Care in the Community
- Innovating hospital-based services and care models
- Care pathways and transitions for populations with complex needs
- Child, youth and family mental health
- Equitable access to care for all populations across the country
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