1. Manitoba’s Office of Rural & Northern Health’s (ORNH) Journey From Distant Relative to One of the Family? Presented by: Wayne Heide

2. A forum in spring of 2002 called the Manitoba Rural Physician Action plan that included various stakeholders in healthcare (medical school, Manitoba Health, Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM), Doctors Manitoba, PARIM) recommended the creation of Manitoba’s ORNH. Mandate – Increase the number of graduating physicians and other health care professionals who choose rural and northern Manitoba as a place to live and practise their professions.

3. Approach was very ad hoc with each region and sometimes facility doing its own thing No coordinated plan, no provincial vision Little consistency of recruitment materials and message Little focus on our own Manitoba trainees No consistent voice or advocate for rural/northern issues

4. The system demonstrated a significant amount of inertia. Organizations are comfortable with their dysfunction and not always open to looking at things in new ways. Change occurred as the result of persistence, regular contact, prescribing projects and repetition of message

5. Same core personnel since 2003 Persistence, consistency of message, small victories, growing positive reputation as an advocate and change- maker for rural & northern recruitment, development of partnerships and a growing number of project champions Dean of the College of Medicine who embraced the necessity to place more importance on social responsibility Research supporting the approach of the ORNH Recognition by Manitoba Health of the unique role the ORNH is playing and could play in the development and implementation of a province-wide recruitment & retention strategy.

6. Not quite but we’ve come a long way baby! Multiple contracts with the College of Medicine (Rural Week, Home for the Summer program, Distributed Medical Education, 2 nd Year medical student exposure to rural FM training sites) Ongoing relationship with Doctors Manitoba Part of the “inner circle” with Manitoba Health (Health Care Partners Network) on the ongoing development and delivery of the Provincial Physician Recruitment and Retention Plan Contract with Health to administer the provincial locum program.

7. Good things we hope A number of new committees have been created around student and resident engagement and multi- disciplinary recruitment. Manitoba provincial election was held on April 19 th