WHITEWATER RESIDENT WINS PRESTIGIOUS HEALTH AWARD
By Marie Zettler
A Whitewater Region resident has received the highest honour given out by the Association of Ontario Health Centres (AOHC).
Nurse-Practitioner Bonny Johnson accepted the Joe Leonard Award earlier this month at the AOHC’s annual conference in Richmond Hill. The Joe Leonard award is given to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to improving the health and well-being of people and communities facing barriers to health.
Ms. Johnson was recognized for initiating the community movement that culminated in the establishment of the Whitewater-Bromley Community Health Center (WBCHC) in the mid-1990s, when it became apparent that the Cobden and area community would be losing its primary care physician, Dr. E.C. ‘Mick’ Pye.
Ms. Johnson, a Registered Nurse with experience in primary and long-term care turned Nurse Practitioner, was working with Dr. Pye at the time. She was motivated by the impending retirement of the doctor to invite him and other community leaders to a conversation around her kitchen table. Those conversations started the group down the road that would lead to the creation of the WBCHC, a hub for community health and well-being which operates sites in Beachburg and Cobden as a satellite of Lanark Renfrew Health and Community Services (LRHCS).
The first challenge was to introduce the Community Health Centre (CHC) concept to the community.
“The biggest hurdle we faced was explaining the model of care to people,” said Ms. Johnson in an AOHC interview. “People hold a status quo concept: ‘I go to the doctor, and I get whatever is wrong fixed, and then I go home.’ So working to promote a model of wellness – explaining that the primary care component is important, but that it’s part of the whole interdisciplinary team – that was challenging. They understood my part of it – the nurse practitioner element, they didn’t question that – but when it came to the rest of it, the response was often, ‘Well, I want a doctor.’ Our message was that it wasn’t just about ‘getting a doctor.’”
Once a steering committee was established, efforts to expand the community’s perception of health care began.
“We did a road show,” Ms. Johnson told the assembled community health professionals to witness the presentation of the award. “We started off with public health and did a presentation, and then the Federation of Agriculture. And they gave us our first cheque, for $100, and that’s when we first started to believe we were on to something and that, ‘Hey, we can do this!’
“We also visited the local hospitals. We went to Renfrew Victoria Hospital, and Randy Penney was the CEO there and he was very, very supportive. We visited with seniors groups. We did a couple of town hall meetings, so that we could get the people who might not understand what this was all about. At this time, it was also pre-amalgamation of municipalities in Ontario, so we approached each one (in the proposed CHC catchment area), and they all very kindly donated a small amount as well, so that we could actually put together a proposal and do a needs assessment.”
There was support from the AOHC from the very beginning.
“They provided us with lots of contacts with like minds, and people at CHCs who had already done proposals, like Woolwich Community Health Centre, in St. Jacob’s, who provided us with lots of support,” said Ms. Johnson.
Renfrew-Nipissing-Pembroke MPP Sean Conway was invited on board and accepted the invitation.
“He agreed to do whatever might be required to gain political support,” said Ms. Johnson. “So he took myself, members of the steering committee and municipal representatives to Queen’s Park, where we would eventually meet with Tony Clement, who was the Minister of Health at the time.”
Ms. Johnson is held in high esteem by her health care colleagues.
“Bonny never had a ‘glass half-empty’ approach, in fact her glass was always overflowing,” wrote Wanda MacDonald, CEO, Pinecrest-Queensway CHC, in a letter supporting Ms. Johnson’s nomination. Ms. MacDonald, who had been Executive Director at LRHCS at the time, detailed how Ms. Johnson had moved from securing funding for the Nurse Practitioner initiative, to working with municipal governments to ensure space was secured for her practice, to then working with physicians and other providers to build up a level of primary care and well-being services out of which she could then present her vision – and population needs-based case – for a CHC.
“Bonny’s positive energy, her dedication to people, her allegiance to the CHC model of care, her leadership, and her commitment to teamwork have all contributed to the success of Cobden/Beachburg’s CHC sites,” said Ms. MacDonald.
Ms. Johnson was presented the award by John Jordan, Executive Director of Lanark Renfrew Health and Community Services, at the gala awards dinner and ceremony. She took the stage to a standing ovation from the community health professionals gathered there and thanked those who had taken the time and effort to help build the community health and wellbeing services in Cobden and Beachburg alongside her.
She credited Dr. Pye with a lot of the early support she received, first in becoming a Nurse-Practitioner to better serve the needs of the expansive and challenging rural area, and later in helping to set the foundation stones for what would later become WBCHC satellite.
Ms. Johnson believes that the CHC model is the best one currently in place to support the changes coming in health care in the future.
“The model allows the community itself to take ownership of their CHC,” she said. “Over the period of time that Whitewater-Bromley has evolved – and it’s not always easy because not everyone agrees on direction – everyone from board members to volunteers in the community who run exercise programs and other activities have contributed because they believe in the health centre, because they feel safe there. That, to me, is much different from health care being dispensed to someone. The community is an equal partner in the centre and their own care.”
The WBCHC catchment area includes the former municipalities of Beachburg, Cobden, Ross, and Westmeath, which now make up Whitewater Region, as well as Admaston-Bromley, with a total population of just over 16,000 people covering an area of approximately 2,000 square kilometers.
To read the full AOHC interview with Ms. Johnson go to https://www.aohc.org/Bonny-Johnson.
As slide show of highlights in the development of the WBCHC can be found at https://vimeo.com/170514389.
The Joe Leonard Award is named after the first Executive Director of the LAMP Community Health Centre based in Etobicoke. For over 25 years, Mr. Leonard touched many lives through his support to others, his leadership, his vision, and his commitment to the community and social justice. The purpose of this award is to recognize individuals who, like Joe Leonard, have demonstrated extraordinary leadership, commitment and support for creative solutions for accessible, high quality and affordable health care.
With files from Jason Rehel, editor and reporter at the Association of Ontario Health Centres (www.aohc.org)
