PMH in New Brunswick

In March 2011, the Primary Health Care Advisory Committee (working committee established by the Minister of Health)) released the committee’s discussion paper: Improving Access and Delivery of Primary Health Care Services in New Brunswick with the recommendation that all New Brunswickers will have access to a family practice team, that is able to provide them with, personalized, comprehensive and co-ordinated primary health care services. In November 2012, the first Family Health Team was officially launched in Miramichi.  The definition of a Family Health Team has been defined as follows: FHTs are locally driven, family health-care delivery organizations that include family physicians, nurse practitioners, nurses and a broad range of other interdisciplinary health-care providers, working together collaboratively to provide comprehensive, accessible, and co-ordinated family health-care services to a defined population, which includes patients who do not currently have a family health-care provider.

In June 2014, The Operational Guide for Family Health Teams was released.  It presents a FHT model adapted to the New Brunswick context, outlines direction for implementation and provides a framework for measuring progress. There are 33 communities identified by the NB Health Council in NB, of which 8 CHNA reports have been conducted & released by Horizon. As of June 2014, Interested Family Health Teams may submit a Letter of Interest Form and wait to receive confirmation to proceed in submitting the Application form. Both Forms may be found in the FHT Operational Guide. Priority consideration will be given to communities that have a Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA) published by their respective Regional Health Authority. The CHNA will help the FHT establish their strategic plan and identify which programs and services they want to offer.