Lesa Semmler

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you to the Member for the question. An advisory committee has been established with the pharmacists appointed by the NWT Pharmaceutical Association to collaborate with the department officials. The advisory committee operates under clear terms of reference and reviews and advises on issues identified during the development and drafting instructions and regulations under the Health and Social Services Profession Act.

To date, this group has convened ten times to address this mandate. As well as through the work of bringing more professionals under the Health and...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned before, this is not taking away benefits from anybody who was previously covered. In the previous policy, it was outdated and there were it was put in place where specific diseases and you had to have a specific disease to fall to be able to qualify for the program. Within that program, there was no like, it just it was a blanket so we didn't you know, and so this time what it's doing is people who are applying are going to be you know, if they make above the threshold, there's and that was part of the standing committee, that there's...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. And thank you for the Member for being able to have this conversation. And I was. I was a Member of the Standing Committee on Social Development, and we did make we did have lots of consultations on this. And what we we did reduce the costs. Like, with the changes that we've put in place, there are members of the residents of the Northwest Territories that had no access to any benefits will now be able to fall under the extended health benefits policy. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I mean, I can we have health centres. We have staff within those health centres. We have community health representatives in the communities. There are we provide information. We work with in collaboration with Indigenous governments. You know, there's wellness departments in some communities. You know, there's mental health and addictions programs in all of the communities. I'm not clear on what the Member is asking. So I mean, if there's more detail that the Member can provide for me as to which areas that she's looking into, I'd be willing to provide...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the scope of practice being considered is in line with the scope of other jurisdictions. The work will hopefully align the Northwest Territories with best practice and establish standards with the rest of Canada provides practitioners and patients and an understanding of what's required and expected of professionals. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, the Government of the Northwest Territories continues to work to address the national shortage of health care professionals that has led to service reductions and system impacts not only in the NWT but across the country. Postpandemic, this shortage has only intensified, with many health professionals resigning, retiring, or reducing their working hours.

The results of our internal staff surveys and feedback sessions indicate that employee recruitment and retention challenges persist within our system. To address this shortage and its impact on our staff, we have increased our...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned in this House, the we are doing a review and the primary health care reform is going to look at how we provide services to all residents in the Northwest Territories. And I understand that there is a model that's been used in Yellowknife which, yes, it is the half of the population but, you know, on the other opposite end is there's the other half of the population that doesn't have access to physicians and services. And, you know, we've heard from Members in this House that said they don't have even an access to a nurse all the time. So we...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, not at this time but I have my department looking into kind of a number of how we can get. But the main goal is to reduce the instance of diabetes and using money on preventative care, so we'll the department is trying to come up with some kind of numbers for the Member. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, there is a lot of work being done in this area so, you know, I want to be able to provide some of the information, and I'll highlight, and then what I don't get to I'll provide that information to the Member, specifically to her riding as well.

So there's early planning for testing culturally grounded approaches to diabetes prevention and management, and this is currently being completed in partnership with the Tlicho government, Tlicho Community Services Agency, Deh Cho First Nations, and NTHSSA Deh Cho region. We've also implemented group nutrition...

Mr. Speaker, I will get back to the Member on this. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.