This article originally appeared in the May/June 2020 issue of the Ontario Medical Review magazine.
In 2020, OntarioMD celebrates its 15th anniversary as a leading primary care-focused digital health organization in Ontario. In that time, we’ve had the good fortune to work with and build strong relationships with more than 18,000 primary care clinicians across the province. As we look to build on Ontario’s strong foundation of EMRs and digital health tools, it’s our relationship with you that we continue to value most.
That’s why in November 2019, we sent out our second annual OntarioMD Clinician Survey. We wanted to hear from you, our most important stakeholders. We wanted to understand how you view OntarioMD. We wanted to know which digital health products and services you use, and how you feel about them. And we wanted to hear directly from you about what we’re doing right – and how we can better serve your needs.
After 15 years, we believe we have a solid understanding of primary care practices and how you use digital health to advance patient care. However, we also know that belief can sometimes cloud reality. We don’t want to set our objectives and goals with educated guesses. Your input is what will make our work, and the system as a whole, better for everyone.
Almost 700 of you responded to our survey, a significant jump from our 2018 response rate. This provided a meaningful sample size, and included representation from a variety of practice types, geographic locations and experience levels. Beyond the data, many of you also shared meaningful comments on our work and digital health tools in your practice. Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback. It wasn’t all positive. But it was constructive and will help us move forward to serve you better.
The demographic portion of our survey helped us paint a picture of you and your practice. Our results show that:
It’s invaluable for us to have a clear idea of the clinicians who are taking advantage of OntarioMD offerings – and those who may not currently. We’re working as an organization and with our partners, including the OMA, vendors, and other health sector stakeholders, on ways to provide you with even more clinical value. Knowing how you practice and who your patients are means we can more proactively meet your needs.
In last year’s survey, 56% of you indicated you were very/somewhat familiar with our organization, and 56% agreed or strongly agreed that OntarioMD understands your practice. We weren’t satisfied with either of those responses and we’ve continued over the past year to connect with you and gain your trust. How? We’re continuing to find new ways to connect with clinicians and create the conversations that build trust and understanding. Our team has always prioritized taking part in health sector events and conferences that provide opportunities to meet with you, online interaction through OntarioMD social media, and ensuring we produce the communications outreach materials that demonstrate the clinical value we can bring to your practice. We recently curated a list of virtual care tools on OntarioMD to help you leverage virtual care in your practice to manage patient care. And we’re building on these interactions by exploring new opportunities to reach clinicians through the OMA and the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO).
We’ve also been focusing on strengthening and bringing more clinical value to our clinician and practice support with our field staff and peer leaders. These are OntarioMD’s frontline members, and your link to the digital health solutions that meet your unique practice needs. Our survey results tell us that those of you who have had opportunities to work with OntarioMD peer leaders and field staff have seen great results for your practice – and we want to make sure more of you are able to access that support when and where you need it.
If this year’s results – 75% said they are very/somewhat familiar with OntarioMD and 69% said we are knowledgeable about clinical practice – are any indication, it seems our efforts are helping us trend in the right direction.
When asked what you considered to be OntarioMD’s most important role, 90% cited helping you connect to clinician data sources as somewhat/very important. We also consider this our most important role – indeed, it’s central to everything we do, from product development to deployment, to support and education. Your ability to use your EMR to connect to digital health tools, system partners and your own patients’ data at the point-of-care is essential for your ability to provide the best care possible. And that digitally driven, patient-focused approach to care is more important than ever in the current system transformation.
You already know the impact Health Report Manager (HRM) – cited as our most used and most popular digital health offering in this year’s survey – has on helping you access information you need from hospitals and specialty clinics in near real time. We’re also actively involved in integrating other important tools into your EMR, including eConsult and the provincial Digital Health Drug Repository and Digital Health Immunization Repository and OLIS. And we were really excited to launch our Insights4Care (i4C) program in 2019. The QI-based program gives you real-time, actionable visual access to the patient data in your EMR measured against a range of clinical indicators through the i4C Dashboard, and complementary practice support through i4C Advisory Service.
There’s lots of work left to do. Last year, 16% of respondents said they were dissatisfied with OntarioMD, while 51% said they were satisfied. Both scores have improved in 2019, with 55% expressing satisfaction with our work and just 7.5% saying they’re dissatisfied. But there’s still plenty of room for improvement there. We’re committed to that improvement, and to continuing work with our partners to develop solutions that help you do what you do best – provide great care for patients.
We invite you to work with us along the journey. We’re successful only when our work helps you achieve your unique practice and patient care goals. And we can only do that when you share with us your insights and ideas. So please connect with us at events, in your office, or by email at support@ontariomd.com.
Dr. Darren Larsen is OntarioMD’s Chief Medical Officer. A practicing family physician for the past 29 years, Dr. Larsen currently teaches at the University of Toronto and is on staff at Women’s College Hospital.
