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Funding for ‘temporary’ Access Care Clinic extended
Posted: March 27, 2026
(March 25, 2026) By: Jeffrey Ougler, North Bay Nugget
Group Health Centre says service will remain until patients are attached to primary care provider
Many area orphaned patients will still have a home for the foreseeable future at the facility established as a “temporary solution” shortly after Group Health Centre derostered some 10,000 members – one sixth of its overall roster – in 2024.
Ministry of Health has committed to continued Access Care Clinic funding beyond March 31, GHC confirmed to The Sault Star this week.
“We are grateful for this support, which ensures patients maintain reliable access to care while efforts to connect them with permanent primary care providers continue,” said Ashlee Gerard, GHC manager of communications, planning and risk.
“We are committed to ensuring that all patients accessing the clinic are attached to a primary care provider.”
Shortly after the derostering, the province stepped in, unveiling plans for a new outpatient clinic funded by the Ministry of Health. The province injected more than $2.8 million throughout a two-year term to establish the clinic, which could service 11,200 patients.
A spate of physician retirements at the time only added to the swelling primary care problem and critics, including Ontario Health Coalition, branded ACC as a Band-Aid solution to a much larger, complex problem.
About one in five people in Ontario do not have a family MD, which will grow to one in four unless action is taken, the Ontario Medical Association has said. It was estimated last year there were some 30,000 people in this area without a primary care provider.
GHC did not indicate specifically how much the province offered up this time around, but said the service will remain open until patients accessing the clinic are attached to a primary care provider.
“The continued support from the government is good news for the community,” Gerard said.
The Ministry of Health did not say how much is earmarked specifically to the clinic’s continued operation.
However the ministry told The Sault Star Tuesday that through its $3.4-billion Primary Care Action Plan, nearly $2.9 million has been directed toward Sault Ste. Marie-area Interprofessional Primary Care Teams (IPCTs) to attach nearly 4,000 people to primary care, building on $110 million in IPCTs in 2024, in which the province earmarked $1.1 million to serve more than 12,000 patients in the Sault Ste. Marie area.
“It is important to note that the clinic is a temporary measure,” said Gerard, adding the duration the East Street clinic remains open — and the associated costs — will depend on the timing of GHC and the community attaching patients to a primary care provider.
“Our focus remains on transitioning patients to primary care so that the clinic can ultimately serve its intended temporary purpose,” Gerard said.
GHC announced in October that through “focused” physician and nurse practitioner recruitment efforts, along with the Grow Your Own Nurse Practitioner Program, some 14,000 Access Care Clinic patients would be to be connected to a primary care provider in the foreseeable future.
As of early January, approximately 5,800 ACC patients were paired with a primary care provider. Gerard said then the centre was rostering an additional 2,200 patients, adding as registered nurses graduated from the Grow Your Own Nurse Practitioner Program, 6,000 additional ACC patients would have a devoted provider.
No firm date was provided.
GHC, which serves some 55,000 primary care and ACC patients, said earlier it has welcomed five new family physicians and three primary care nurse practitioners since June 2024. The Grow Your Own Nurse Practitioner Program, launched last summer, is also “well underway.”
“As attachment to primary care progresses, we will continue to work with the province to assess needs and ensure continuity of care for patients,” Gerard said this week.
GHC says ACC continues to play an “important” role in supporting patients awaiting attachment to a primary care provider.
Led by nurse practitioners, the clinic provides essential services during this “transition period,” including episodic care, chronic disease management, prescription renewals, referrals and continued access to GHC programs and services, Gerard said. Patients also benefit from GHC’s electronic medical record system, which preserves their health history and enables continued access to MyChart, GHC’s secure online patient portal.
The clinic reduces the risk of “unnecessary” emergency department visits and other “burdens on our already strained health system,” ACC’s website says.
“While we continue to focus on recruiting and retaining health-care providers, this clinic ensures that our patients receive the care they need,” the site says.
Former MPP Ross Romano was instrumental in securing initial ACC dollars; GHC was asked, but didn’t indicate, if current Sault Ste. Marie MPP Chris Scott, a former Progressive Conservative and current independent, was involved in the latest funding ask. Six months into his term, in September 2025, Scott was booted from the PC caucus after he was charged with assault and assault with a weapon, allegedly throwing a highchair at his wife. Scott has called the charges “baseless.”
The issue remains before the courts.
