Primary Health Care Planning Meeting, June 20, 2008

Appendix D: The Meeting Evaluations

The following is a verbatim transcript of the meeting valuations submitted by the participants at the June 20, 2008 meeting. While there were over 80 in attendance at the meeting, only 39 evaluation forms were submitted, and not all those submitting an evaluation form answered all of the questions.


Five questions were asked:

  • What worked for you?

  • What didn't work for you?

  • What would you want more of?

  • What would you tell others about today?

  • Further comments?


The responses to each question are set out below.


Question 1 - What worked for you?

  • Talking with a variety of people from different areas of interest.
  • Non-confrontational.
  • Group work interesting.
  • Small group discussions on specific topics.
  • Excellent suggestions by group members.
  • Focus groups generate good ideas and raise new issues. Extremely informative.
  • Well organized.
  • The information that was provided.
  • Information moving to VIHA & MOH.
  • Everything I went to.
  • Lots of interesting themes.
  • Well planned. Excellent discussions.
  • Good discussions. Hope some messages got through to VIHA.
  • A good opportunity.
  • Great process that encourages safe dialogue and positive ideas – focused discussion.
  • Hearing concerns of community members.
  • Questions set as agenda – having choice of which discussion groups to participate in.
  • The clear leadership of the leader of the group and messages we want to send.
  • Organization, well run. Facilitators good at getting topics from audience (AM) and committee(PM).
  • Focus patient centric.
  • The ability to come and discuss all the problems that are here on Gabriola.
  • The organization and input from many.
  • The focus in a positive way.
  • Hearing the “Common Thread” of the combined topics.
  • Getting questions out for discussion at the beginning.
  • Good start – generating questions from the group.
  • Very nice to hear everybody’s opinion.
  • Very enlightening – a broad exposure of views.
  • Collaboration, open forum and safe to speak out.
  • Good exchange.
  • Good format to receive and process ideas.
  • Liked the interactive format.
  • The “Open Space” process really showed the diversity of ideas/concerns that inhabitants of the island have about the “health system”.
  • Good facilitation and process.
  • Good format – very informative about what is currently available. Also learned about perceived gaps in the system.
  • Networking and sharing with community.
  • Round table discussions – felt that the government and VIHA people were listening and well-informed.
  • Many opportunities for input.
  • Formula for information exchange.
  • Sticking up for myself when I was the only one with an unpopular viewpoint.
  • Non-confrontational
  • Encouraging mixing everyone up to dialoque with "new" people.
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Question 2 - What didn't work for you?

  • There wasn't much that didn't work.
  • Length of day.
  • 9AM – 3PM on Friday is not a good time – people working not able to attend.
  • A group member that had a personal axe to grind! However, the facilitator and the group members did manage to deal with the topic. (Not much anyone can do about one disaffected negative person.)
  • One focus group was virtually hi-jacked by a highly negative person.
  • A bit noisy – but this is Gabriola.
  • Acoustics.
  • Time used.
  • Couldn’t get to all the discussions.
  • Discussion of more than 1 year. It is time for VIHA to act.
  • Couldn’t hear very well in the afternoon sessions.
  • Not sure where the next steps go. Who leads?

  • Scope of community members seems limited. Perhaps time of day or day of week?

  • Didn’t know about it ahead of event. (but that could be my fault – I don’t always read the papers.)
  • Zero.
  • Not aware of anything not working.
  • Nothing didn’t work.
  • Somewhat hard to hear group discussions.
  • Some issues didn’t get discussed as not much interest in some questions – which were nevertheless important.
  • I think that the purpose of primary health care does not include mental health and home care. However, they are also important.
  • Need more people involved.
  • It was great – Ian did a fantastic job of facilitating!
  • Disrespect for questions asked. Tendency to drift off focus on the cafe groups.
  • I think it might work better to have outside professionals available for questions.
  • While many concepts/ideas were laid out, I am unclear who or which organization will take this material and translate it into concrete actions and objectives.
  • Lack of acknowledgement that some services may be restricted due to financial constraints, critical mass, etc.
  • Somewhat repetitive in afternoon process.
  • All good.
  • People that think that Emergency Health Care and lack of doctors are the only topics worth solving.
  • All day session – too early start.
  • Having people roll their eyes at me.
  • Length of day.
  • Was occasionally difficult when one or two peopleonly wanted to address their personal agenda.
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Question 3 - What would you want more of?

  • Perhaps plans for follow-up discussion – where to go from here?

    Next steps?

  • Concrete steps forward.
  • Communication, communication, communication.
  • I would want more focus on the specific topic – sometimes we got a little off topic. Facilitators could have a quick lesson on getting us back on track!
  • More focus on the health care centre, physician retention, more attention to coordination of various groups/societies.
  • A swimming pool!
  • Doctors on call 24 hours a day and nurse practitioner – or more than one – to relieve the pressure on present doctors.
  • Doctors and nurses – Emergency facilities 24/7.
  • Pool and exercise therapist.
  • A swimming pool. Preventative and post op. Surgery. More doctors for emergency calls. Gab. Doctors on call are very tired. Small hospital (4 beds) 24 hour care and specialized emergency equipment & RN.
  • Feedback.
  • Stats and hard information. $. Action!
  • Firm commitment and action by VIHA.
  • $ to keep our clinic running successfully.
  • Identification of what is possible from MOH and health care industry.
  • More people involved?

  • Variety of community perspectives.
  • Doctor support.
  • Preventive medicine, dietician (i.e. PHC) access to midwives.
  • Support of alternative referrals: i.e. homeopathy, Feldenksais(?

    ), acupuncture, chiro., herbalism, naturopath.
  • ______ more of today – then more specialized groups to carry discussions further.
  • Solution.
  • Need more input from the Provincial Government in our need for more Health Care.
  • Strong follow-up and being listened to.
  • These brainstorming info groups should be better advertised.
  • Lunch
  • Home support back on the island will help doctors.
  • Physicians – one or two more to prevent burnout of the ones we have.
  • Repeat the process 6 or 9 months from now.
  • Information which is designed for the lay person – more open forums, more public information on GHCS.
  • Good clear info.
  • Hopefully we don’t need any more!
  • Fewer topics leading to defined action steps.
  • Information summarized – formation of plan with involvement of all key players.
  • More young people’s opinion.
  • Opportunities to dialogue with VIHA managers.
  • Action – implement some of ideas.
  • Listening skills.
  • Concrete steps forward.
  • More of all of this!
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Question 4 - What will you tell others about today?

  • Well organized day. Ideas developed to start moving forward with.
  • Excellent support for community involvement.
  • That the energy, commitment of the volunteers is exemplary.
  • They should have come to have their voices heard; however, they should send in their responses on-line!
  • Very mixed attitudes, but overwhelmingly positive.
  • Very interesting and pertinent.
  • There is still hope for improvement in our Health Care.
  • The above.
  • Good discussion..
  • Worked well, lots of opinions were expressed.
  • Get involved.
  • Coordination/teamwork/awareness.
  • Important experience.
  • Great community engagement process!
  • Gabriola residents and the community are working towards developing a coordinated effort to address the health care concerns on the Island.
  • We need to continue to support our doctors and we want to more thouroughly understand what roles VIHA plays.
  • Self evident truths – but the need for health education and information is lacking.
  • Discussion groups well done.
  • Useful information.
  • That is was a wonderful opportunity to discuss all the needs.
  • A very active and positive day with a vision. Ministry of Health and VIHA please come through on the vision.
  • Everyone could have benefitted even just to listen to all the suggestions.
  • It was an excellent way to open dialogue and collect info.
  • I need to focus on the “definition” of Primary Health Care. Lots of work needed on our Health Care on the Island. A good start.
  • Good meeting.
  • Should have been there.
  • Look out for a report on this day and become more involved – I hope it will be in the paper as well as on line.
  • Lots of info. More needed.
  • Well run exercise, good chance of the messages at least getting through to the Minister.
  • The missed a great opportunity to be heard and help guide the future of health care on Gabriola.
  • Encourage people to attend.
  • About information that was shared.
  • What exists on Gabriola.
  • Will encourage others to start trying to get involved.
  • Should have been there.
  • Good listening.
  • Mostly it was people who are already sold, nay-sayers stayed away.
  • Excellent support for communty involvement.
  • We learned a lot.
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Question 5 - Further comments?

  • Excellent day! I look forward to the results of all our work being made public.
  • View of services as divisions without good public communications.
  • More actions. Less talk.
  • Thanks for the lunch!
  • Excellent process to engage in – the facilitation and organizational style made conversations possible.
  • Thanks for keeping us informed of meetings.
  • Working with what health provision already exists – publicising and offering alternatives that are possibly Island driven (i.e. independent of Big Daddy – The Feds & Provincial Health Care).
  • Happy that we were given this opportunity to voice all our concerns regarding our Health Care on Gabriola.
  • Our island definitely could benefit from a Care Committee that would pool all the skills from various workers & volunteers to make our daily living needs addressed whatever they may be.
  • Working together with doctors and other organizations. Since home support has been taken to Nanaimo the system has fallen apart (5 years ago).
  • Number one issue for me today was that we need to coordinate our resources – arranging interagency meetings will lead to more coordinated efforts and reduction of duplication. More health based programs for seniors.
  • More info and meetings to clarify.
  • Not all residents feel welcome at Hope Centre or Gathering Place.
  • ?

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