Ontario seeking primary care teams for 300,000 patients in plan to match people with doctors

Ontario is looking for up to 80 new or expanded primary care teams to serve 300,000 patients, as it plans to build a system that automatically attaches people to a family doctor or nurse practitioner team based on their postal code.

Health Minister Sylvia Jones says the province is launching a call for proposals on Thursday, with $213 million attached to create or expand the 80 teams as part of a $1.8-billion announcement she made on the eve of the provincial election.

Jones and former federal Liberal health minister Jane Philpott, who the Progressive Conservative government has tapped to be the head of a provincial primary care action team, announced in January that Ontario would spend that money over the next few years to give all Ontarians access to primary care by 2029.

The government plans to achieve that by creating a system that automatically connects people to a primary care team based on postal code, and this call for proposals is targeted to the postal codes that have the highest number of people without a primary care provider.

Jones says the 80 new or expanded primary care teams will be expected to pull from the Health Care Connect waitlist to fill their rosters.

She says today's announcement builds on a previous one from early 2024, when 78 new or expanded primary care teams were announced.

"What's exciting is we've already seen some of those teams are completely operational and actually exceeding their commitment to matching patients who are looking for primary care clinicians," Jones said in an interview.

"[This] announcement really builds on that. Up to 80 teams is what we hope to be able to approve, frankly, by summer and again, if the February announcement is any indication, they're ready, and they're ready to get started, and they're ready to hire and to take on those patients."

Jones and Philpott's plan would connect two million more people to primary care, which they say would fulfil the goal of attaching everyone to a family doctor or nurse practitioner.

The Ontario Medical Association says there are 2.5 million Ontarians without a family doctor right now and the number is expected to rise to 4.4 million in a year, but Jones cites data from the Canadian Institute for Health Information, which says that 90 per cent of Ontarians have a regular health-care provider. This plan would cover that last 10 per cent, she says.

The primary care teams would include a family doctor or nurse practitioner, and other health-care professionals such as nurses, physician assistants, social workers and dietitians. Operating models include family health teams, community health centres, nurse practitioner-led clinics, and Indigenous primary health-care organizations.

The list of 125 postal codes where the need is highest is just the start of the location-based plan, Philpott said.

"There are needs everywhere, but in some cases, the numbers of people who don't have access to primary care are higher than in other areas," she said.

"We all wish that we could fill these gaps overnight, but it's going to take a little bit of time, and so with these very significant investments that the government is making, we wanted to make sure that, as we start to roll it out, that it goes to the places where there are very high numbers of unattached."