Provincial funding to help 10,000 patients connect to doctors in Pickering and Ajax

Nearly 10,000 patients in west Durham Region can now be connected to a family doctor after the province awarded just under $3.8 million to four family health clinics in the newly formed Durham West Family Health Team.

Members of the team joined Ontario Finance Minister and Pickering-Uxbridge MPP Peter Bethlenfalvy Friday morning in making the announcement.

The new partnership with four Family Health Organization clinics – Central Pickering FHO, Priority Health FHO, Baywest FHO and Ajax Harwood FHO – will not only attach thousands of Durham residents to a primary care provider, but see the team provide collaborative comprehensive care for each patient.

“An investment of $3,799,000 is strengthening primary care capacity and delivering stable, reliable health care closer to home for families in Pickering,” said Bethlenfalvy. “This funding will help connect up to 9,936 patients to a primary care provider, providing greater certainty, continuity of care and access close to home.”

The structure of the new family health team will include allied team members like nurses, social workers, pharmacists, community paramedics, physiotherapists and other medical professionals, with a goal of to delivering quality primary care at every stage of life, close to home, for existing and new patients. Work is already underway to prepare the family health team to accept new patients.

Dr. Lubna Tirmizi of the Durham West Network said he was “thrilled, proud and humbled” to get the funding to launch the family health team. “We are grateful to both the provincial government and specifically the Primary Care Action Team for giving frontline family physicians the opportunity to have a voice in building out the future of primary care in Ontario.”

Interprofessional primary care teams connect people to a range of health professionals that work together under one roof, including family physicians, nurse practitioners, registered nurses, registered practical nurses, physician assistants, physiotherapists, social workers, dieticians and pharmacists, helping patients to receive more connected and convenient care.

“After more than thirty years caring for this community, I’ve learned that good primary care is not only about seeing more patients faster – it’s about caring for people more fully,” said Dr. Carlos Yu, the Ajax Harwood Lead. “We have long built our practice around patient education and group-based care, and the Durham West Network Family Health Team now lets us bring that approach, and the team around the physician – nursing, health promotion, and navigation – to hundreds more families across Durham West. Helping patients build their own capacity for health has always been at the heart of what we do.”

The Durham West Network Family Health Team was funded through the latest call for proposals under the Primary Care Action Plan, with all 124 teams receiving funding expected to connect another half a million patients to primary care across Ontario. Each team has established a plan to attach a high proportion of unattached people in their community, including those on the Health Care Connect waitlist.

“Through our Primary Care Action Plan, we are connecting more people to care and have already exceeded our 2025-26 attachment target,” said Health Minister Sylvia Jones. “By connecting more families to care in the region, our government is taking the next step toward connecting everyone in the province to primary care by 2029.”

Ontarians looking to find a family doctor or nurse practitioner can register with Health Care Connect or call 811.