By Doug Draper
It’s official. The province’s Liberal government has chosen the person to come in as “supervisor” and take control of a Niagara Health System that, in many Niagara residents’ views, has been so badly mismanaged it is about to implode.
Kevin Smith, the NHS's new supervisor
That person is Kevin Smith, who is currently the president and CEO of St. Joseph’s Hospital in the Hamilton area and who, according to his resume, has years of experience in the management of hospital and healthcare services.
The appointment of Smith, announced this August 31 by Ontario Health Minister Deb Matthews, comes less than three weeks after the health minister finally agreed to bring someone in to take control of the many services in what remains of six hospitals the NHS has been responsible for operating across the Niagara, Ontario region over the past 10 years.
The appointment means that the existing NHS board, directed by its current chair Paul Leon and former chair Betty Lou Souter, is sidelined while the supervisor moves forward with his job. It also means that Ontario’s ombudsman, Andre Marin, could launch an investigation if he receives enough information from Niagara residents that this hospital system has mismanaged its duties and the many millions of our tax dollars entrusted to it each year to deliver adequate health services to the residents of this region. Search for Ontario Ombudsman and click down to contacts for Marin if you wish to be one of the many who will surely file complaints and urge him to launch an investigation.
Kim Craitor, the Liberal MPP for the Niagara Falls riding who has long been a critic of the way the NHS has operated area hospitals, told Niagara At Large he is pleased with the appointment. “This individual (Smith) is held in great respect for his expertise about hospitals,” said Craitor, adding that the former provincial Conservative government also brought him in to supervise hospital systems in Ontario that were having serious problems functioning on their own.
Not everyone is pleased with the announcement, however.Wayne Redekop, a former Fort Erie mayor who is running against Craitor as the NDP candidate in the Niagara Falls riding, fired out a media release that says; “The appointment of a supervisor, at this stage, is a completely inadequate response to the problems at the NHS and it is not a solution to our healthcare woes. … The Liberal government was missing in action while services were eliminated, hospitals were closed and access to care was deteriorating. … Now, with an election just weeks away, they are trying to pretend they’ve solved things with this appointment.”
NAL is receiving email from other residents in the region, questioning why the prepared announcement by Matthews places ‘Dr.”, as in Dr. Kevin Smith, in front of Smith’s name when his resume shows he has a doctorate in philosophy rather than in medicine. They felt this is deceptive at a time when many critics of the NHS said they would prefer that someone with a medical background take over for the ousted CEO, Debbie Sevenpifer, who had a background in financial accounting.
Craitor said that it is possible that no government would ever be able to pick “the perfect person” to clean up what he openly agrees is a mess when it comes to the way the NHS has been administered. If you bring in someone from within the general Niagara/Hamilton area (as is the case with Smith) you will have some who say they are too close to the NHS situation, said Craitor, and if you brought someone in, as expert as they may be, from North Bay, Ontario or as far away as British Columbia, others will complain that they don’t know enough about the Niagara area to improve conditions here.
“Let’s all remember that it is very unusual (for any government) to put in a supervisor to fix a system that has not worked,” he said. “So let’s take the politics out of it and work together” for a better hospital system.”
Niagara At Large has accessed a backgrounder on Kevin Smith from a McMaster University website. It reads as follows:
“After graduating from McMaster with a B.A. in 1986, Kevin Smith earned his Doctorate in Philosophy at the University of Sussex in England and completed the Chief Executive Officer program for Healthcare Leadership at the Wharton School of Business. Dr. Smith began his career in medical education, followed by leadership roles in university administration before taking on senior management roles in academic hospitals.
Dr. Smith is currently President and CEO of St. Joseph’s Health System, a multi-site Academic Health Science Centre, which includes services spanning, community-based to tertiary acute-care. An Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine at McMaster University, Kevin remains active in academic programs and Faculty Executive. Dr. Smith also participates in a number of provincial and national government bodies including the Canada Foundation for Innovation, an independent organization supported by the Government of Canada to fund research infrastructure, the Association of Canadian Academic Health Care Organizations and the Council of Academic Hospitals in Ontario. His continuing education has focused on governance in the public and private sectors and he is professionally certified by the Institute of Corporate Directors.
In 2003, Dr. Smith was awarded the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal, which recognizes Canadians who have made outstanding contributions to their communities or to Canada as a whole.
Dr. Kevin Smith would like to be remembered for supporting McMaster’s academic advancement in the Hamilton teaching hospitals and for helping to preserve the Mission of dignity and respect began by the Sisters of St. Joseph’s.”
(Niagara At Large invites you to share your views in the comment boxes below.)
Niagara At Large 
Here are some suggestions on making a complaint to the Ontario Ombudsman, from the Facebook site, Every Patient Matters:
Every Patient Matters
Tips for those who want to complain to the Ombudsman’s office about patient safety and quality of care:
1 – Make it about NOW: Say what information or remedies you are looking for from the hospital as of today, that has not already been resolved. Keep it current even if the incident happened a few years ago.
This is because the Ombudsman’s office might argue that they are only dealing with complaints since the supervisor stepped in. Of course, brand new cases can’t easily be sent to the Ombudsman anyway, as he may refer them to the relevant first steps to resolution: Patient Relations at the hospital, College of Physicians and Surgeons, etc.
Don’t be dissuaded by an argument that your case is too old. If you get that kind of response, please let us know at impatient4change@gmail.com and we will try to help.
2 – Explain how your individual case is an example (or microcosm) of the widespread systemic issues already covered in the press and discussed at public events: Here are a few I’ve heard from Niagara: number of cleaning staff, number of hospital beds, hospital amalgamations, sending people home still infected, etc. There are others as well.
3 – Ask about Disclosure/Transparency: What documents would you like to get from the hospital, including personal health information (such as your chart or if there has been a root cause analysis) and access to public information (like how many patients have been through what you have). How many times was your room cleaned? Try asking the hospital and if you don’t get a response, ask the Ombudsman.
4 – Ask about hospital privileges and other management decisions: While the Ombudsman doesn’t have jurisdiction over doctor performance, he may have jurisdiction over what privileges the hospital has given its doctors, knowing about their performance. And this doesn’t just go for doctors. How has the hospital rewarded staff whose performance is questionable? In what ways do you think hospitals have failed to protect patients from poor care? What policies and practices does the hospital use to keep the rooms clean? If you’re concerned about these things, say so.
5 – Write about the hospital resolutions process: If you are concerned about the proximity between the “patient relations” process and the “risk management” process, let the Ombudsman know. If you are concerned about hospital management or board secrecy, or lack of public consultation, or failure of the hospital to take responsibility for patient outcomes, write it down. If you want a new mechanism to resolve complaints that is binding, measured and enforced, to prevent the same situation from happening to others, let him know. If you think hospital self-policing isn’t good enough, say so.
6 – Include the Ministry of Health, over which the Ombudsman also has jurisdiction. Did the Ministry do enough to protect patients from the time they heard about the C. difficile outbreak? Did they do enough in the time leading up to the takeover of the hospital? Did they respond fast enough or well enough? If you are concerned about lack of transparency about complaints made to the Ministry of Health, let the Ombudsman know.
7 – Request a wider investigation: If you want the Ombudsman to come down to your community and meet with the public, ask for it. What better way for him to hear community concerns, than to hold a town hall with the Ombudsman present. If you think the Ombudsman should also speak with the hospital CEO, chair of the board or LHIN, suggest it. If there is a town hall, all the better if it is modern: with a twitter chat, broadcast live.
8 – Let them know you’re not alone: If you know of others who have experienced similar problems, let the Ombudsman know. Of course, everyone’s privacy must be respected, but an isolated case is different from a systemic problem, and systemic problems are what the Ombudsman addresses best. Let him know if where there’s a spark, there’s a fire. Include relevant newspaper articles or patient safety data. If the Ombudsman thinks the issue is big enough, he can start a SORT investigation (that’s what his office did with the G20). Once a SORT investigation starts, much more information is collected.
9 – Make a reference to MUSH: Want the Ombudsman to have power over all hospitals all the time? What about other areas of government, including long-term care, children’s aid, and schools? If so, say it.
10 – Make sure you answer all the Ombudsman’s questions in their online complaint form:
http://www.ombudsman.on.ca/Make-a-Complaint/Complaint-Submission.aspx
Here’s more information: http://www.ombudsman.on.ca/Make-A-Complaint.aspx
Please let us know if the Ombudsman’s office turns you away. We would like to help. Send us an email at impatient4change@gmail.com
Ontario Ombudsman – Complaint Submission
http://www.ombudsman.on.ca
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My question is: What happens to the three NHS board members; Chair Paul Leon, former chair Betty Lou Souter and vice chair David Schram, of the Tripartite Review Committee, now that the Board has been dissolved???
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An appeal to Kim Craitor: many of us respect you for your outspoken opposition of your own government’s failure to acknowledge, let alone address, the long-standing problems of the NHS that the implementation of the HIP and the C.diff. outbreaks have brought to a head. So please do yourself a favour, and cease making remarks about “taking the politics out of it” and “working together”. As far as Niagara is concerned, your current Minister of Health has shown no interest or concern for anything BUT politics, Kim, and this appointment is just the latest example. Bringing in a healthcare administrator from within this LHIN — the subject of the Ontario Ombudsman’s scathing report, “The LHIN Spin”, published just over a year ago — is like asking the fox to supervise the hen-house. Moreover, as today’s press conference with Smith makes clear, his mandate is to give the NHS and its arrogant board a nice coat of whitewash. Period. And then presumably the patients in Niagara can go back to dying because they aren’t close enough to a properly equipped ER, or from hospital acquired diseases. Meanwhile, the NHS, never showing any willingness to admit to its mistakes, continues to avoid transparency and accountability — and is assisted, as of January 1, 2012, by the new exemptions from disclosure brought in by your government under the “hospital secrecy act”. So please don’t insult us with talk about “working together”, Kim, if you don’t mind. It doesn’t take a genius to see how the cards are stacked in this little game.
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This seems like appointing a CEO to investigate other CEO’s more or less. All cut from the same administrative cloth. Sort of a Jack Kitts type of deal. We know how helpful he was.
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I spent nearly three months at St. Josephs Hospital in Hamilton. They saved my life and I was glad to get there from GNGH,I would never have survived here, at St,Joseph three doctors took care of my kidneys alone, as that was a teaching hospital I had lot’s of people watching over me, The food was well balanced, the whole place was bright and clean, and they were wiring and painting all the time. If this new man can make that happen here we will not be afraid to go to the emergency room. or stay, we need protocols in place for quarantine of infected patients from the general patients. and end this death count.
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And this is going to solve all the problems before the Election – Give me a break !!!!!!!!!!!!!! No it wont even come close and then what – We should trust them after the election ?????
Sorry Kim your efforts have been of very little use and you are a member of the governing party – that shows how little the Liberals care about what the voting public thinks and it is time the voting public showed the Provincial Liberals the same reaction they just gave the Federal Liberals. This appointment is nothing more than a condescending insult.
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I find it really difficult to trust anything the current provincial government does in regard to the NHS debacle. Is this another government yes man hired to provide lip service to the electorate prior to the upcoming election? How much is this going to cost us in administration fees etc? We don’t even know how much in severance Ms Sevenpifer recieved.The sad reality is, when mistakes are ignored too long, the cost to correct them grows exponentially. Just look at the eHealth fiasco.
Why hasn’t the LHIN been taken to task for allowing the NHS to devastate our local healthcare? Apparently they weren’t competent enough to realize anything was wrong.
Responsibility for the current situation in the Niagara Health System begins and ends with the provincial government. This reaction is too little too late. We were ignored as alarmist and ignorant when whole communities pleaded for a better plan than the HIP penned by the NHS. A provincial election can’t come too soon.
But then this is just one man’s opinion.
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Feel free to correct me anyone if I am mistaken, but this man, who was appointed to oversee the Cambridge system, was appointed there because the local CEO would not cave in to the local LHIN and was thus displaced. I may be misinformed but believe from previous correspondence I received that this was true. If so, that does not sound promising.
Re. Mr. Jardine’s statement, St. Joe’s is an excellent facility which I would never criticize, but it is so because of its location and the fact that it can, due to its big city locale and corresponding adequate funding, draw the best of the best, Not so with the NHS. Therein lies a significant difference.
As for statements in the Review today, “perception is reality”. No, REALITY IS REALITY. The system IS broken, not just perceived to be broken.
As well, trust cannot be restored by window dressing but rather by results, that is improved care. Trust is a major factor and always has been in the NHS eg some of the stats re Clostridium difficile deaths. My understanding in at least one case was, that if a patient was free of C diff at the time of death, they are not counted in the stats even though the weakness and debility caused by contracting the disease (often hospital acquired) led to their death by the original presenting diagnosis which should have been treatable.
Mr. Smith, who in the paper is repeatedly called Kevin as opposed to Dr. Smith (likely a psychological ploy to make him deliciously warm and fuzzy) is said to be a good listener. Just a reminder, so was Jack Kitts. Big deal! The Ontario Health Coalition have been far better listeners than any government appointed overseer could ever be and they have the facts and personal testimonials from around the province to back up their suggestions.
The Review also stated criticism and scrutiny were due to the C diff outbreak. The criticism predates the outbreak by far.
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Follow the money. Large corporations own the newspapers.
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