Evidence of meeting #33 for Health in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was program.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Dr. Vaughn, if provinces want to continue with the software's implementation, how can they, if only 15% of the intellectual property is publicly owned? Is that realistic?
What are the metrics for success?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
Going forward, the open standards approach—which allows for customization for provinces and territories, building on all of the great work that PrescribeIT fulfilled—allows for the provinces and territories to develop tools that make sense in this rapidly evolving technological environment.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
In March 2023, Dr. Vaughn, you initiated a sustainability review. I'm trying to figure out why you kept investing in the service if you knew it wasn't sustainable.
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
The question was on the fact that Health Canada advised us that we would not be having any ongoing funding after March 2026, so we continued to provide the service in that interval while at the same time looking to use the valuable lessons learned and resources—the security, the authentication and the technical tools that can be used in the open standards approach—as we have in eConsult, eReferral and Patient Summary.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Dr. Vaughan, what usage threshold did you set initially to determine whether the program was viable? Has that threshold been reached, yes or no?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
Mr. Chair, I'll go to my colleague for the technical question.
Strategic Advisor, Canada Health Infoway
Thank you.
The target that we had set out for ourselves to be financially sustainable was 75% of all transactions in Canada.
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
If you wish to describe as a failure something that has been developed that works at 99% technical success—
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Dr. Vaughan, five out of 75, according to my calculations, is not a passing grade. Is that correct? Did we take the same math course?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
The reality is that the Canada Health Infoway cannot make provinces or territories use their policy levers. We did everything we could to enable, but we couldn't make them mandate, legislate or use their policy levers.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Okay.
Dr. Vaughan, listen, we could split hairs over the program's success criteria, but it's coming to an end in late May. For me, when a program ends, that means it has failed. Again, we could debate that at length.
On what date did the board of directors decide to part ways with the CEO, Mr. Green?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
On the question of when the CEO was relieved of his duties, it was last Wednesday.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Would you agree, in the name of transparency, to make public the entire record of that meeting of your board of directors?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
As you can appreciate, this was an in camera conversation around personnel and human resources, so I defer.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Dr. Vaughan, you said a little earlier that you've always been transparent. Now you're telling me that you don't want to tell us what's going on within your board of directors, which manages $300 million in public funds.
Is that correct?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
We would be happy to make those available to you, with the understanding that they are confidential and in camera.
Bloc
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Dr. Vaughan, we agree that, if everything has been managed properly, everything should be public, right? That's how it normally works.
If you had to do it over again, what would you do differently to ensure that the program doesn't end as planned at the end of May?
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
That's a great question.
The lessons learned are that in a federated health model there need to be some national ties that bring things together across the country. It's a legislated piece that would drive that.
Maxime Blanchette-Joncas Bloc Rimouski—La Matapédia, QC
Dr. Vaughan, do you acknowledge that the federal government shouldn't have interfered in Quebec's jurisdictions and that it should have transferred the funds to Quebec so that we could set up our own system and manage it ourselves?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sukh Dhaliwal
Dr. Vaughan, the time is up, but give a short answer, please. Go ahead.
Board Chair, Canada Health Infoway
I'm not sure what the question was, Mr. Chair.
Liberal