New Vancouver urgent care centre already risks relocation for condo development
Credit to Author: Pamela Fayerman| Date: Wed, 18 Dec 2019 00:57:43 +0000
Three weeks after a downtown Vancouver urgent primary care centre opened in leased space last year, an architectural firm hired by the building owners filed a rezoning application that could lead to the building being torn down.
The taxpayer-funded centre at 1290 Hornby St., near St. Paul’s Hospital, is on notice that it may have to move if the rezoning proposal succeeds.
“If the rezoning is approved and the proposed building proceeds to redevelopment, the existing commercial tenancies will have to come to an end,” said Neal Wells, a spokesman for the City of Vancouver.
The primary care centre opened in November, 2018, after Vancouver Coastal Health spent $2 million to renovate the space, according to documents obtained under a freedom of information request. The centre has an annual operating budget of $3.72 million.
Wells said the rezoning application, which was filed on Dec. 13, 2018, is expected to go before city council next year.
Urgent care centres are a major priority for Health Minister Adrian Dix and he has said the purpose of such clinics is to provide individuals with faster access to non-emergency care and to reduce demand on hospital emergency departments.
Carrie Stefanson, a spokeswoman for Coastal Health, said no one at the health authority was aware that a development application would be filed when the space was renovated “but we were certainly aware the site was a candidate for potential redevelopment … it’s a low rise building in a sea of highrises and everything around it is being redeveloped.”
Coastal Health had a five-year lease on the site — it was formerly occupied by the Three Bridges Community Health Centre, which moved down the street — so it made sense to continue using the same facility, Stefanson said.
The health authority’s lease ends in 2021 and it is trying to negotiate another five-year lease on the site, she said. This, despite the rezoning proposal to build a 35-storey residential tower with an art gallery.
City Centre Urgent Primary Care, at Hornby and Drake in Vancouver.
An officer of the company that owns the property and who is familiar with the development could not be reached.
Earlier this year, a left-leaning think-tank criticized the health authority for partnering with a private company and in a privately owned building. The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives embraces the concept of the clinics where doctors, nurses and other health professionals work in teams, but it is critical of the health region for partnering with a medical corporation — Seymour Health Centre Inc. The company, which has 80 years of experience operating medical clinics, was contracted to run the downtown Vancouver centre and one in North Vancouver.
Dr. Afshin Khazei, medical director of the downtown centre, said he’d be “shocked” if it has to move but he’s not privy to any information about the development and “there’s been no talk of moving.”
Khazai, who is also an emergency doctor at Vancouver General Hospital and medical director of another urgent care centre in North Vancouver, said 15,000 patients have been treated at the downtown clinic since it opened a year ago — just under half the maximum capacity — but the volume is steadily going up as more people become aware they can go to the urgent care centre instead of hospital emergency departments.
The government has announced 14 urgent care centres across the province and plans to spend $150 million over three years on them. They are intended to provide treatment for illnesses or injuries that should be addressed within 12 to 24 hours.
Broken bones, infections, fevers, sprains, and cuts requiring stitches are typical cases.
The urgent care centres are also mandated to provide followup care and try to link patients to family doctors taking new patients.
Documents show that 26 per cent of patients who went to the downtown clinic in one month earlier this year didn’t have a regular family doctor.
There are eight family medicine doctors on the second and third floors of the Hornby Street building who are accepting patients and Khazei said there is enough space there to accommodate 22 more doctors.
Health minister Adrian Dix said in an interview that 11 urgent care centres have opened so far across the province but three more will be in operation early next year and he hopes to see a total of about two dozen. “I’m very positive about what we’ve achieved so far,” he said, noting that the centres are taking some of the pressure off hospital emergency departments and helping to link patients to family doctors if they don’t already have one.
Meanwhile, to prepare for the holiday season when doctors’ offices are closed, VCH has posted information on a website to help individuals needing urgent medical care: www.vch.ca/holidaycare
Twitter: @MedicineMatters