Bulletin 220410 — Physician Services Agreement On-Call Coverage Programs
The ministry is accepting new application for on-call coverage programs beginning April 1, 2022
To: All Physicians
Category: Physician Services
Written by: Negotiations Branch; OHIP, Pharmaceuticals and Devices Division
Date issued: April 13, 2022
On-Call Coverage programs
As per Schedule B of the 2021 Physician Services Agreement (PSA), the Ministry of Health and the Ontario Medical Association are inviting applications from new groups of physicians who have been excluded from receiving Hospital On-Call Coverage (HOCC) funding under the HOCC funding moratorium, as well as those physicians who have been limited in accessing funding under the following programs: Community Palliative On-Call (CPOC), Complex Continuing Care (CCC) On-Call and Physician On-Call in Long-Term Care Homes (POC). The parties have also agreed that HOCC groups of fewer than five that provide the same level of uninterrupted call as groups of five or more will receive the rate payable to groups of five.
The Physician On-Call in Long-Term Care Homes (POC) and Complex Continuing Care (CCC) On-Call programs do not require external applications as current processes continue to be in place to align program funding with bed counts in long-term care homes and complex continuing care hospitals respectively.
Based on review of the applications received (for HOCC and CPOC ) between April 1, 2022, and October 1, 2022, and review of bed count data (for Long Term Care POC and CCC On-Call), up to $12.5 million of new funding will be made available for these purposes, with payments for new HOCC groups, expansion of existing HOCC groups, HOCC groups of less than five, CPOC, POC and CCC to commence effective April 1, 2023.
If you are interested in applying for funding under the HOCC or CPOC programs, please email oncall@ontario.ca for more information. For HOCC, please work with your hospital administration to submit an application.
Hospital On-Call Coverage Program review
Further to the above expansion, a time-limited joint Ministry of Health/OMA HOCC working group will be established for the purposes of designing for implementation a burden-based HOCC program to replace the existing HOCC program. The joint working group will consult with relevant stakeholders, such as Ontario Health (OH) and the Ontario Hospital Association (OHA). The burden-based HOCC program will be modelled on commonly recognized levels of call intensity that will be agreed upon by the parties. Further details will be provided as they become available.
Keywords/tags
PSA; Hospital; Physician; On-Call Coverage Programs; HOCC; CPOC; CCC; POC; Application
Contact information
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