With the start of provincial consultations on health care the New Brunswick Health Council (NBHC) is releasing two articles on key observations about the health system. The articles, available at nbhc.ca, discuss a decline in life expectancy as well as variability in health service quality among regions of the province.
“New Brunswickers will be sharing their needs and concerns regarding health care,” said Stéphane Robichaud, CEO of the NBHC. “Understanding that we have experienced declining life expectancy and inequities in health service delivery across the province will help them to decide their healthcare priorities.”
As part of its mandate to inform New Brunswickers about the provincial health system, the NBHC created these articles using several sources of data, both from its own surveys, as well as external sources. These results showed that life expectancy in New Brunswick has been declining since 2013, compared with the Canadian average which has continued to rise during that period. The impact of potentially avoidable death on this decline is discussed in the article, with the most important causes of death highlighted.
The article on variability shows that New Brunswickers do not have the same access to health services, including family physicians and surgeries. They also don’t have care experiences that are equal, and they experience significantly different outcomes from the health services they receive.
“Shorter lives due to potentially avoidable death and inequities in health services should concern all New Brunswickers,” said Robichaud. “We were excited to make publicly available this content, a deliverable from our current business plan. We feel this work is a positive contribution to the Provincial Health Plan consultation.”
The NBHC is an independent organization that measures, monitors and evaluates New Brunswick’s health system performance through a citizen-centred mandate of performance measurement and public participation.
NBHC Contact: Nay O’Leary, 506-869-6714 or nay.oleary@nbhc.ca
Web site: www.nbhc.ca