An Ottawa-based group is hoping to change the face of health care in Canada starting right here at home. The plan is to build two massive medical facilities worth millions of dollars: one stop shopping, of sorts, for health care. The first one will be built in the Kanata Research Park; the other off Prince of Wales near JDS Uniphase. They'll be open for business in two years’ time.
The man behind the Pinnacle Centres of Healthcare Excellence, William Wallace MacKinnon, may not be well known. But he is being backed financially by two big names in this town who are gambling on a new direction for health care.
Off Legget Drive, it is an empty parking lot now, nestled behind Kanata's Brookstreet hotel. But the lot will be transformed by 2017 with 220-thousand square feet over four floors at a cost of $80-million dollars.
‘In a typical Pinnacle facility that size,’ says William Wallace MacKinnon, the founder and chairman of Pinnacle Centres of Healthcare Excellence, ‘we would have 40 family doctors, 40 to 50 specialists, ambulatory surgeries, blood and fluid, pharmacies, diagnostic and home health care.’
An easier approach to health care, he believes for both patients and doctors. Ottawa is the first market for Pinnacle with a second building going off Prince of Wales near JDS Uniphase and the RCMP building. Eight more are planned across Canada; then a billion dollar expansion into the US. Backing them financially are Ottawa tech giant Terry Matthews, now behind the real estate company KRP, and developer John Ruddy with Trinity Development Group Inc. Pinnacle is a for-profit company but says it will be able to offer doctors more revenue with less overhead through an economy of scale. That, says MacKinnon, allows doctors to spend more critical time with their patients.
‘We make a profit, but there’s no need to make a ridiculous profit.’
The key to making this work of course is attracting the doctors. So the perks are plenty: free on-site daycare, free parking, a fitness centre. There is even a retreat for doctors and their families with boating and waterskiing.
‘Doctors work hard,’ says CEO Ray Marshall, ‘it’s a hard busy life and we're trying to provide incentives to the doctors to work with us and make their lives easier.’
Pinnacle plans to hire 300 health care support workers to help staff the facility but the ultimate aim are doctors and dentists, especially females struggling with work-life balance.
Dr. Marina Straszak-Suri knows all about that struggle. The Ottawa gynecologist is backing Pinnacle, saying the concept is exactly what she could have used as a young doctor and mother.
‘This is a first in terms of thinking about how physicians can carry out their day to day life,’ says Dr. Straszak-Suri.
While she has no immediate plans to join Pinnacle she adds, ‘I’m thinking towards the future, that might be a semi-retirement way to go.’
Pinnacle has launched a massive advertising campaign with a full page ad in the local paper. It's an unusual approach to health care but Pinnacle says health care today is facing unusual challenges.
