Study results: primary care access for those with a provider

We conducted a study on journey mapping of an attached person’s primary care visit. Journey mapping is a visual engagement tool that provides a holistic picture of a person’s experience of accessing primary care, in this case.

Note: “attached” means having a primary care provider - a family doctor or nurse practitioner.

Study objectives

1. Describe an attached person’s primary care experience in the Frontenac, Lennox & Addington (FLA) region using the journey mapping method.
2. Identify challenges and barriers throughout the journey.
3. Explore opportunities for improvement for unattached people and for primary care delivery.

Method

This qualitative study conducted in the FLA region

• included 6 individual interviews and 2 focus groups
• conducted with community members to elicit their primary care experience.
• Participants were passively recruited via FLA OHT social media channels, posters in the community, and snowball recruitment. 

Participants

16 community members

• aged 25 to 84
• 1 male, 15 female
• Participants included 3 indigenous, 2 francophone
• 1 caregiver, several participants with chronic disease, physical and cognitive disabilities

Study findings

Themes emerged from the journey mapping data, which we have identified in the chart below. The themes allowed us to identify change ideas to enable more equitable and inclusive access to primary care.

Conclusion

Research Lead, Dr. Chavlovski recognizes the importance of involving the community in co-designing our health-care system: “If we’re going to create new services, it’s essential to ask those who need the services what they want and need”.

• Journey mapping helped to highlight opportunities for improvement at local, practice and system levels
• Consideration should be given to leveraging patient empowerment practices, digital tools, continuing professional development activities and practice level process improvements
• Further study of patient care experience needed among marginalized populations of both attached and unattached individuals
• Primary care service transformation and co-design require community participation and feedback
• Patient journey mapping can be a key input in patient-centered and quality improvement processes to:
  • Generate change ideas that improve the individuals’ primary care experience
  • Demonstrate the receptiveness of the system to patient feedback on the structure and quality of their own healthcare experiences

Researchers

Anna Chavlovski, MD FRCPC,
Family Physician at Loyalist Family Health Team;
Member of FLA OHT Access to Primary Care Working Group
 
Monica LaBarge, PhD, MPH, MS,
Assistant Professor and Researcher, Smith School of Business, Queen's University

This study was reviewed for ethical compliance by the Queen’s University Health Sciences and Affiliated Teaching Hospitals Research Ethics Board.