York University and Toronto Central Community Care Access Centre (CCAC) have entered into a formal partnership to collaborate on joint research and training opportunities in the home and community care sector.
The partnership will focus on the following key priorities:
- culture of health care;
- supporting caregivers;
- managing multiple medications;
- prevention of falls;
- palliative care and managing pain during end-of-life care;
- supporting better aging;
- developing health policy;
- self-management programs for people living with chronic disease; and
- enabling inter-professional team work across different parts of the health-care system.
"With the ongoing shift toward home and community care, our partnership with Toronto Central CCAC is timely in that it will advance research in these increasingly important areas, as well as benefit students with practical, experiential education opportunities," says York University Faculty of Health Dean Harvey Skinner (right).
The innovative Toronto Central CCAC-York University partnership involves faculty and students from all five degree programs in the Faculty of Health (kinesiology & health science, psychology, nursing, global health, and health policy & management). It will offer experiential learning placements for undergraduate students and diverse, collaborative research opportunities for faculty and graduate students.
"This is a unique partnership," says Stacey Daub, CEO, Toronto Central CCAC. "It's driven by our shared passion for learning and innovation, influences our clients' care and enhances their experience. The greater opportunity is to create an understanding of the importance of care planning in a team: The more CCAC care coordinators work as a team with physicians and other health-care partners in the community, the more we'll see better health outcomes for patients in the future."
Toronto Central CCAC connects people across Toronto with quality in-home and community-based health care. It provides information, direct access to qualified care providers and community-based services to help people come home from hospital or live independently at home. In any given month, it serves a population of nearly 1.5 million residents in the Toronto area, helping with their care needs in the community. In any given month, it supports more than 19,000 people of all ages, cultures and backgrounds: 1,700 kids getting support at their schools, 400 adults receiving rehabilitation services, the transition to a long-term care home for 240 clients and more.