Shared Services Saskatchewan, which will be known as 3s Health, takes over a big chunk of the work formerly done by the Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations (SAHO) and was approved by SAHO members this week.
SAHO will retain about 20 employees who work in labour relations, such as collective bargaining, arbitration, grievances and training human resources and management on the collective agreements.
They will continue to be led by Bernie Young, who was vice-president of labour relations under the previous arrangement, said Marj Gavigan, spokesperson for 3sHealth.
The 80 employees transferred to the new agency will continue to work on group purchasing, payroll and group benefits under the leadership of CEO Andrew Will, who replaced Susan Antosh, who has moved to e-Health.
The budget of the two organizations remains the same as SAHO's was before the change, Gavigan said.
The new agency arises from the 2009 Patient First Review of health care in Saskatchewan, which recommended leveraging shared services across the regions, the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency and affiliated organizations, such as long-term care homes, to improve quality and achieve efficiencies that could be reinvested into front-line care, Will said.
Initial projects have proven successful.
"In the past two years there's been a small shared services office that has done the planning for this new organization and has done a few initiatives. They've saved in excess of $10 million over the past two years.
"3sHealth's intention is to expand well beyond that," Will said.
"We've set a target over the next five years to achieve a cumulative total of $100 million in savings."
"Our focus is more than just cost savings. It's also on improving administrative services and clinical support services across the province.
"We believe that good quality services actually cost less."
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Betty Ann Adam
Quelle/Source: The StarPhoenix, 20.04.2012
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