Province investing $26M into faster emergency care in the region

NEWS RELEASE
MPP MIKE HARRIS
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The Ontario government is investing $26,922,856 in Waterloo Region to connect people to emergency care faster and increase the availability of ambulances.

“The Ontario Government continues to bolster healthcare in Waterloo Region,” said MPP Mike Harris, Kitchener-Conestoga. “This funding will mean more access to fast, reliable emergency care that is critical for the health and safety of our community.”

In the Regional Municipality of Waterloo, Ontario is increasing land ambulance funding by 15 per cent, bringing the province’s total investment in the region to $26,922,856 this year. This increase in base funding helps ensure municipalities address increased costs so they can continue to deliver high-quality emergency care.

In addition, to further reduce delays paramedics encounter when dropping patients off at a hospital, Ontario is investing $1,543,734 in the Regional Municipality of Waterloo through the Dedicated Offload Nurses Program to hire more nurses and other eligible health professionals dedicated to offloading ambulance patients in hospital emergency departments.

The program allows paramedics to get back out into the community faster and respond to their next 9-1-1 call sooner, and has played a significant role in reducing ambulance offload times and increasing ambulance availability for 9-1-1 patients across the province. As a result of this investment and the dedication of health care professionals, provincial ambulance offload time has been reduced by more than 50 per cent since its peak in October 2022.

To ensure urgent patients receive critical care sooner, Ontario is also continuing to implement the Medical Priority Dispatch System (MPDS) across the province. The system helps to better prioritize and triage emergency medical calls and dispatch paramedics sooner. Over the last year, the province has rolled out MPDS to Mississauga, Kenora, Thunder Bay, Ottawa and Renfrew, and are accelerating progress to implement the system at the 15 remaining dispatch sites across Ontario over a year ahead of schedule.

With Your Health: A Plan for Connected and Convenient Care, the government continues to take action to strengthen the health care system so that it is responsive and is evolving to meet the health needs and priorities of Ontarians, no matter where they live

QUICK FACTS 

• The government’s additional investments into the Dedicated Offload Nurses Program over three years will help municipalities cover around 800,000 dedicated hours to support offloading ambulance patients in the emergency department. 
• Currently over 200 patient care models led by paramedic services across the province are now approved to provide appropriate and timely care options for eligible 9-1-1 patients in the community, instead of in the emergency department. 
• The government is helping more students become paramedics by adding more than 300 spaces in paramedic programs at provincial colleges across Ontario, making it easier for future paramedics to access education and training closer to home. 
• The Ontario Learn and Stay Grant is providing over 350 first-year paramedic students studying in select Northern postsecondary institutions with funding for free tuition, books, compulsory fees and other direct educational costs. After graduating, students will need to work in the same region they studied for a minimum of six months for every full year of study funded by the grant.

“The Region of Waterloo Paramedic Services team is dedicated to providing compassionate, timely, and high quality patient care,” said John Riches, Chief, Region of Waterloo Paramedic Services. “This funding both helps ease offload delays in all three local emergency departments and assists with the increased costs of service delivery so we can focus on providing the best care possible to the community.”

"As we grow with care and focus on equitable services for all, decreasing offload delays in hospitals allows our paramedics to spend more time our community helping people who need it most, and saving lives,” said Karen Redman, Chair of the Region of Waterloo. “We are grateful for the provincial government’s commitment to paramedic services and the life saving work paramedics do every day.”

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