Adapting Our SCOPE: Lessons Learned from Spreading and Scaling Efforts to Integrate Care

Parisa Mehrfar; Jaclyn Martyn; Celia Laur; Noah Ivers; Aleisha Fernandes; Harpreet Bassi; Mohamed Alarakhia; Nadia Alam; Pauline Pariser

doi:10.12927/hcq.2023.27051

Adapting Our SCOPE: Lessons Learned from Spreading and Scaling Efforts to Integrate Care

Healthc Q. 2023 Apr;26(1):50-58. doi: 10.12927/hcq.2023.27051.

Authors

Parisa Mehrfar¹, Jaclyn Martyn², Celia Laur³, Noah Ivers⁴, Aleisha Fernandes⁵, Harpreet Bassi⁶, Mohamed Alarakhia⁷, Nadia Alam⁸, Pauline Pariser⁹

Affiliations

¹ Is the program director at Women's College Hospital, overseeing the provincial expansion of the SCOPE program. She is also an adjunct lecturer at the Institute of Health Policy, Management, and Evaluation (IHMPE) in the University of Toronto in Toronto, ON.
² Is a SCOPE summer student volunteer at Women's College Hospital in Toronto, ON. She is currently completing a Bachelor of Medical Sciences at the University of Western Ontario in London, ON.
³ Is the scientific lead of the Office of Spread and Scale at the Women's College Hospital Institute for Health System Solutions and Virtual Care and an assistant professor (status) at IHPME in the University of Toronto in Toronto, ON.
⁴ Is a family physician; holds the Canada Research Chair (Tier 2) in implementation of evidence-based practice at Women's College Hospital; and is an associate professor with the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of Toronto in Toronto, ON.
⁵ Is a SCOPE summer student volunteer at Women's College Hospital. She is currently completing a Masters of Epidemiology at Queen's University in Kingston, ON.
⁶ Is the vice president of Strategy, Planning and Stakeholder Engagement at Niagara Health, ON. She also holds an adjunct faculty position with the School of Health Sciences at Western University in London, ON.
⁷ Is a family physician at the Centre for Family Medicine and the founder and managing director of the eHealth Centre of Excellence. He is the faculty lead, Digital Health and Innovation at the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine (Waterloo Campus) at McMaster University and an adjunct professor at the University of Waterloo in Waterloo, ON.
⁸ Is the primary care lead for the Halton SCOPE program in Halton, ON. She is involved in policy roles at the regional and provincial levels both during and after her tenure as president of the Ontario Medical Association (2018-2019). She is cross-appointed as faculty at University of Toronto's Department of Family and Community Medicine and the Institute of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation.
⁹ Is a primary care lead at the University Health Network and a fellow with Women's Virtual at Women's College Hospital in Toronto, ON. She is a full professor in the Department of Family and Community Medicine, Temerty Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, and she is chair of the Mid-West Toronto Ontario Health Team. She can be reached by e-mail at pauline.pariser@uhn.ca.

PMID: 37144702
DOI: 10.12927/hcq.2023.27051

Abstract

SCOPE (Seamless Care Optimizing the Patient Experience) launched in 2012 to support primary care in downtown Toronto with live navigation and rapid access to acute and community care resources for primary care providers (PCPs) and their patients. Ten years later, over 1,800 PCPs across Ontario have signed up for SCOPE and over 48,000 interactions in the form of e-mail, fax, phone and secure messaging have been conducted. Case examples illustrate the ways in which SCOPE has been adapted across a range of Ontario Health Teams, including under-resourced, small urban and rural sites. Primary care engagement, change management strategies and flexibility to meet the individual needs of each site have been key factors in the successful spread and scale of SCOPE's services.

MeSH terms

Humans
Ontario
Primary Health Care*