FRANCAIS

November 29, 2004

Health Minister Tim Sale and Healthy Living Minister Theresa Oswald today released Manitoba’s second Comparable Health Indicators Report. This year’s report focuses on healthy living and the performance and delivery of health programs and services in Manitoba.

"Most Manitobans are pleased with health care services and programs in the province," said Sale. "More than 80 per cent of Manitobans who received a health care service indicated they were satisfied with the way the service was provided. An estimated 85 per cent of Manitobans who recently received a service rated the quality of care they received to be excellent or good."

"Approximately 62 per cent of Manitobans rate their health as very good or excellent while 10 per cent rated their health fair or poor," said Oswald. "All Manitobans have a role to play in building healthy communities. By making healthier choices, we reduce our risk of contracting serious diseases and chronic conditions that impair our quality of life and add to rising health care costs."

Three general categories were reviewed in the 2004 Comparable Health Indicators Report including:

·         Healthy Living: self-reported health, life expectancy, infant mortality, low birth weight, chronic diseases, health promotion and disease prevention.

·         Access to Health Care Services: health information or advice, primary health care, family doctors, immediate care, routine care, ambulatory care, wait times for elective diagnostic services and prescription drug expenditures.

·         Patient Satisfaction/Quality of Care: Telehealth services, community-based care, physician care, hospital care and overall health care.

 Sale said the 2004 report provides information about the health of Manitobans and their experience with the province’s health system. He said comparable information for other provinces will be available on a group of 70 indicators.

All provinces, territories and the federal government are reporting on comparable indicators as part of a commitment made by first ministers in September 2000 and February 2003.

"Enhanced accountability and improved performance reporting assure Manitobans that health reforms are occurring," said Sale. "To ensure our health system is the best it can be, we need to base future health-related decisions on sound research and data. The Comparable Health Indicators Report helps to provide that information."

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NOTE: The Manitoba Comparable Health Indictors Report is available on the Internet at http://www.gov.mb.ca/health/index.html.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

MANITOBA’S COMPARABLE HEALTH INDICATORS REPORT

• Manitoba’s Health Indicators Report stems from a commitment in 2000 and 2003 by Canadian first ministers. Each government committed to a public report on Canada’s health care system. Governments worked together to develop a comprehensive framework and agreed to look at comparable performance indicators.
• Manitoba released their report today while the federal government and remaining provinces and territories will release comparable reports tomorrow.
• The Office of the Auditor General has provided an independent verification of Manitoba’s report.
• The report compares Manitoba with comparable data for Canada as a whole.
• 70 comparable performance indicators were developed in co-operation among governments. Because of differences in data available in each jurisdiction, not all jurisdictions were able to report data on all 70 indicators. This year, Manitoba is reporting on 66 out of 70 indicators. Last year, Manitoba reported on 56 out of 67 required indicators.
• A full listing of all 70 indicators will be available on the Manitoba Health website on Tuesday, Nov. 30 at http://www.gov.mb.ca/health/index.html to coincide with provincial and federal releases.

REPORT HIGHLIGHTS

Patient Satisfaction with Care Received:

• 83% of Manitobans reported that they were very or somewhat satisfied with the way overall health care was provided in 2003.
• 84% of Manitobans reported that they were very or somewhat satisfied with the way Telehealth services were provided in 2003.
• 81% of Manitobans reported that they were very or somewhat satisfied with the way community-based care was provided in 2003.
• 91% of Manitobans reported that they were very or somewhat satisfied with the way physician care was provided in 2003.
• 83% of Manitobans reported that they were very or somewhat satisfied with the way hospital care was provided in 2003.

Patient Perceived Quality of Care Received:

• 85% of Manitobans rated the quality of overall health care received to be excellent or good in 2003.
• 80% of Manitobans rated the quality of Telehealth services received to be excellent or good in 2003.
• 76% of Manitobans rated the quality of community-based care received to be excellent or good in 2003.
• 92% of Manitobans rated the quality of physician care received to be excellent or good in 2003
• 82% of Manitobans rated the quality of hospital care received to be excellent or good in 2003.

Access to Health Care Services:

• In 2003, 86% of Manitobans reported having a regular family physician. This was comparable to the Canadian rate of 85%.
• 82% of Manitobans reported having no difficulty accessing health information or advice in 2003.
• 75% of Manitobans reported having no difficulty accessing immediate care in 2003.
• 81 % of Manitobans reported having no difficulty accessing routine care in 2003.

Physical Activity:

• the percentage of Manitobans who reported being physically active increased between 2000 and 2003 from less than 20% in 2000, to approximately 28% in 2003.
• nearly half the Manitoba population (47%) reported being inactive in 2003.

Weight:

• 18% of Manitobans surveyed in 2003 are obese according to their self-reported height and weight.
• The percentage of Manitobans who are obese has increased from 15% in 1994 to 18% in 2003.
• The percentage of the population considered obese is higher in Manitoba than for Canada as a whole.

Smoking:

• 11% of teenage males in Manitoba reported that they were current smokers in 2003.
• 17% of teenage females reported that they were current smokers in 2003.
• More than half of the teenagers who reported they smoke reported that they smoked on a daily basis.
• There has been a drop in the number of Manitoba teenagers who reported being smokers since 1994 and notably since 2000. The percentage of teenagers who reported being current smokers fell from about 20% in 2000 to slightly less than 15% in 2003.

Second-hand Smoke:

· 20% of Manitobans reported that they had been exposed to second hand smoke in a public place during the previous month in 2003.

· More than 10% of Manitobans reported they had been exposed to second hand smoke at home during the previous month in 2003.

· More than 10% of Manitobans reported they had been exposed to second hand smoke in a vehicle during the previous month in 2003.

Injury:

· The rate of potential years of life lost for unintentional injury is higher for Manitoba than the Canada average. This reflects either a higher rate of death due to unintentional injury, death due to injury at a younger age or both.

Self-reported Health:

· The percentage of Manitobans who rated their health as very good or excellent in 2003 was 62%. This percentage was statistically significantly higher than Canada’s percentage of 60%.

· The percentage of Manitobans who rated their health as fair or poor in 2003 was 10%.

Life Expectancy at Birth

• Since 1979, life expectancy has increased for both Manitoba and Canada by between three and four years.
• A female child born in 2001 in Manitoba can expect to live an average of 82 years compared with 76 years for a male child, a difference of six years.

Life Expectancy at Birth by Income

• For Manitobans born in 2001, males in the highest income group are expected to live about six years longer than males in the lowest income group. Females in the highest income group are expected to live about two years longer than females in the lowest income group.

Health Adjusted Life Expectancy at Birth

• Females born in 2001 are expected to live about 70 of their anticipated 82 years in full health. Males are expected to live about 67 of their anticipated 76 years in full health.

Health Adjusted Life Expectancy at Birth by Income

• Females born in 2001 who are in the highest income group are expected to live about five more years in full health than females in the lowest income group. Males in the highest income group are expected to live about six more years in full health than males in the lowest income group.

Infant Mortality:

• The infant mortality rate for Manitoba has decreased from 11.7 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1979 to 6.6 deaths per 1,000 live births in 2001.
• In 2001, the infant mortality rate for Manitoba was higher than the Canadian rate of 4.4 deaths per 1,000 live births

Mortality Rate for AMI:

• The mortality rate for acute myocardial infarction (AMI) has decreased from about 140 deaths per 100,000 population in 1979 to about 50 deaths per 100,000 population in 2001.
• The mortality rate for AMI for Manitoba men was more than double that for Manitoba women (69 deaths/100,000 population for men compared to 31 for women) in 2001.

Mortality Rate for Stroke:

• The mortality rate for stroke has decreased from about 65 deaths per 100,000 in 1979 to about 35 deaths per 100,000 in 2001.

Lung Cancer:

• Lung cancer is the most frequent cause of cancer deaths in Canada with about 45 deaths per 100,000 population.
• The incidence of lung cancer in men is about 1.5 times higher than in women but, over time, there has been an increase in the incidence of lung cancer in women. The incidence of lung cancer in men is declining.

Colorectal Cancer:

• Colorectal cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in Canada.
• The mortality rate for colorectal cancer is almost twice as high for men as for women in Manitoba (24.0 deaths per 100,000 population for men compared to 13.5 deaths per 100,000 population for women).
• The mortality rate has been decreasing over time, both nationally and provincially.

Diabetes:

• The percentage of Manitobans who have diabetes increased in the late 1990s from 4.6% in 1997/98 to 5.5% in 1999/2000.

Chlamydia:

• The incidence rate of Chlamydia in Manitoba is almost double the Canadian rate. Both have been increasing for the past few years

November 29, 2004