On January 4, 2020, just two days after I took the reins of CEO at Ornge, the World Health Organization first signaled that there was a cluster of pneumonia cases of unknown cause in Wuhan, a city in central China.  At that time, a total of 44 cases were reported.  Over one year later, there have been more than 135 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 globally and nearly 3 million deaths. 

Needless to say, COVID-19 has dominated our lives, and at Ornge, it has been a main focus of our work for the past year – keeping our staff safe, developing novel clinical protocols for transporting COVID-19 patients, adapting equipment and standing operating procedures for our new reality, and importantly, contributing to the Ontario health care system’s COVID-19 response efforts including participating in planning activities at the Critical Care Command Centre and numerous other planning tables,  facilitating movement of laboratory samples from northern communities to the provincial laboratory in Toronto, implementing surge capacity for critical care patient transport, and designing and delivering a vaccination program for Ontario’s 31 remote Indigenous fly-in communities.

While focused on these extraordinary and immediate tasks, we have not lost site of the bigger picture for Ornge.  I am pleased to present our Strategic Plan 2021-2024 which will guide us as we stretch even further to achieve the best possible outcomes for our patients and provide innovative approaches for better integrating care throughout the province.

You can view the plan here.

Thank you. 

Dr. Homer Tien 

• Healthcare Partners
• Inside Ornge
• Patients and Families