How an east-end Toronto hospital is helping patients find a family doctor

A Toronto hospital in the city's east end has opened a new clinic in the hopes of helping patients find a family doctor.

Michael Garron Hospital officially launched what it calls the East Toronto Primary Care Navigation Clinic on Oct. 27.

Patients without a family doctor are called "unattached," Dr. Carmine Simone, executive vice-president of medical operations, partnerships and innovation at the hospital, told CBC Toronto. And the hospital believes there are tens of thousands in need of one in the east end alone.

The goal of the clinic is to get patients the more immediate primary care they might need and eventually connect them with a doctor in their community.

"It's a temporary clinic, but it bridges that very necessary gap so that patients don't continue to return to the emergency department for their primary care needs."

"Our hope is that we will eventually connect all patients in east Toronto with primary care and scale this to even go beyond our community," Simone said.

"Our dream is that we are no longer needed."

In a news release this week, the hospital said the clinic includes a family doctor, nurses and a navigation counsellor, all of whom work together to provide co-ordinated care.

Patients without a family doctor who do not require specialized care are referred to the clinic from the hospital's emergency department, mental health outpatient programs, paediatric clinics and family and newborn clinic, the hospital said.

At the clinic, patients receive short-term primary care follow-up appointments — usually two to six visits — to stabilize them medically and connect them with community support, the hospital said.

Clinic staff work during these visits to connect each patient to a permanent, long-term primary care provider, the hospital said. The clinic also provides "social prescriptions" to patients who might need additional support in such areas as housing and food.

The clinic is a part of a larger ongoing initiative in east Toronto to connect 11,000 patients with a primary care provider by next summer. It is also funded by the province, which is aiming to connect every Ontarian to a primary care provider by 2029.

Dr. Catherine Yu, chief and program medical director of the department of family and community medicine at the hospital, said the clinic makes medical care more accessible to patients without a family doctor.

"I think that for the longest time, finding a family doctor has been tricky. It's not one that's easily navigable," Yu said.