A new Primary and Community Health Care Framework sets a long-term direction for primary and community healthcare in the NWT but introduces no specific actions, timelines, funding or service changes, the GNWT says.
“For many years, healthcare providers have worked to improve access, strengthen continuity of care, and make services more culturally safe. What has often been missed is a shared direction that brings those efforts together,” said health minister Lesa Semmler in the Legislative Assembly on Thursday.
A Friday news release asserted the NWT health and social services system had made progress over several years to “improve access, strengthen continuity of care, and increase cultural safety” – but added challenges remain.
“We recognize many residents continue to face challenges accessing care closer to home and care that is culturally appropriate,” the news release continued.
The GNWT said the framework is centred on three principles: Indigenous cultures, interconnected care models and a system that learns. The document will guide planning and policy development.
“Transforming primary and community health care cannot be accomplished by this government alone,” Semmler said.
“This framework establishes how the health system designs care with, for, and by Indigenous peoples, and promotes an organizational culture that continuously learns, adapts and improves based on the experiences of clients, communities, and frontline staff.”
Healthcare sustainability
The framework’s release followed just days after a committee of MLAs released its own Report on Healthcare Accountability and Sustainability.
Since October 2024, the legislature’s Standing Committee on Social Development has been researching the accountability and sustainability of the NWT healthcare system.
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In its final report, the committee issued 28 recommendations categorized into five themes: workforce sustainability, healthcare system structure and reform, fiscal and operational sustainability, leadership and governance, and licensing and regulations.
“Committee understands that issues and solutions within NWT’s healthcare system have and are continuing to evolve. Committee believes health care sustainability is a complex issue that will not be solved in the life of the 20th Assembly,” the report said.
“Achieving and maintaining strategies for healthcare sustainability in the Territory should remain a years-long, intentional pursuit by the Government of the Northwest Territories.”
Some of the report’s recommendations that relate to the framework include:
- creating a targeted initiative to expand and support the integration of nurse practitioners in small communities, to improve access to timely primary care services;
- developing a plan for how team-based care will operate in small community health centres and health cabins;
- creating bursary and funding programs for Indigenous residents of small communities to pursue nursing education programs; and
- creating staff-patient advocate positions in each small NWT community.
The Department of Health and Social Services has received intense scrutiny since the release of the an audit that found “serious shortcomings” persist in the NWT’s child and family services.
Yellowknife Centre MLA Robert Hawkins had announced he would introduce a motion in the Legislative Assembly on June 4 to split the department in two. One would focus on health – the likes of clinical services, primary care and public health, Hawkins said – with the other handling social services such as child and family services, mental health and addictions, and community wellbeing.
That motion and a motion to censure Semmler were ultimately not introduced.
In a statement issued June 4, Semmler rejected calls for her to resign.
“I understand that people are frustrated. I understand why people are impatient. I understand why families, communities, MLAs and Indigenous governments expect better,” the minister stated.
“I am asking residents to know that the work to change [the health and social services system] is underway, that I am accountable for continuing that work, and that I will not step away from it.”
