Talk:Niagara Health System

Edit Request
Hello all, my name is Anna and I have a conflict of interest with Niagara Health System. I have been working on a new draft with reliable sources and looking for editors input and assistance on making the changes. The draft has been posted on my user sandbox User:Ancobi/sandbox.

Here is what you will find in my draft:
 * Niagara-on-the-Lake is no longer a site of NH
 * Added other NH locations: Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls, Long-Term Care Home in Welland, Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St. Catharines

My draft doesn't include the sentence about Deb Matthews announcing the closure of 5 hospitals out of 6. The information is inaccurate, the Welland Site will remain open and the location and type of services is still being determined.

Another thing to note about my draft is that it doesn't include the Controversies section. My reasoning for this is that the sources that support the information no longer exist.

I have provided multiple sources that are reliable and support my changes. I'm looking forward to your feedback. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ancobi (talk • contribs) 17:38, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Reply 26-AUG-2019
Regards, Spintendo  02:02, 27 August 2019 (UTC)
 * 1) You've placed edit suggestions in two different locations: your draft version and this talk page. Please place all of your proposals in one central location for review, either in the draft, or on the talk page.
 * 2) The COI editor is reminded of the need to sign all talk page posts using four tildes ( x4).
 * 3) When ready to proceed with the requested information placed in one location, kindly post a new  template below this post. Thank you!

Reply 28-AUG-2019 - Suggested Draft
Thanks for the reply and I apologize for having my edits in two different places. I have added my draft below for your review.

Here is what you will find in my draft:
 * 1) Niagara-on-the-Lake is no longer a site of NH
 * 2) Added other NH locations: Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls, Long-Term Care Home in Welland, Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St. Catharines
 * 3) My draft doesn't include the sentence about Deb Matthews announcing the closure of 5 hospitals out of 6. The information is inaccurate, the Welland Site will remain open and the location and type of services is still being determined.
 * 4) I didn't include the Controversies section. My reasoning for this is that the sources that support the information no longer exist.

Suggested Draft

The Niagara Health System, or Niagara Health (NH) is a multi-site hospital amalgamation, comprising the following sites serving over 450,000 residents across the 12 municipalities making up the Regional Municipality of Niagara, Canada.


 * Douglas Memorial Site in Fort Erie
 * Greater Niagara General Site in Niagara Falls
 * Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls
 * Port Colborne Site
 * St. Catharines Site
 * Welland Site
 * Long-Term Care Home in Welland
 * Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St. Catharines

NH has more than 900 Acute Care, Complex Continuing Care, Mental Health, Long Term Care and Addiction Treatment beds. A wide range of inpatient and outpatient clinics/services are provided across the sites. It is one of Ontario's largest hospital systems, with 4,800 employees, 600 physicians and 800 volunteers, with an annual operating budget of approximately $550 million.

Niagara Health is the result of a government directive, in 1999, to amalgamate the 8 hospital sites serving the Regional Municipality of Niagara. At that time, the St. Catharines community was served by the Shaver Hospital, for chronic care, the Hotel Dieu Hospital, a Catholic acute care facility managed by the Religious Hospitallers of St. Joseph, and the St. Catharines General Hospital. With amalgamation, the Hotel Dieu was placed under the governance and management of Niagara Health and renamed the Ontario Street Site. Meanwhile, the Shaver was assumed by Hotel Dieu management and renamed Hotel Dieu Shaver Health and Rehabilitation Centre.

In 2013, Niagara Health opened the St. Catharines Site, replacing two older St. Catharines sites, the St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites. This brought new regional services to Niagara including Cancer Care, Cardiac Care and an expanded Mental Health and Addictions Program.

The town of Niagara-on-the-Lake took ownership of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Site in August 2018.

Thank you! --Ancobi (talk) 18:59, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

Reply 28-AUG-2019
Regards, Spintendo  20:11, 28 August 2019 (UTC)
 * 1) Thank you for providing the requested information in one central location. It is much appreciated.
 * 2) Unfortunately, your edit request cannot be approved because text from your proposal has been found to be insufficiently paraphrased from the source material.
 * 3) All additions to an article need to be placed using an editor's own words and phrases, per WP:CLOSEPARAPHRASE.
 * 4) Kindly redraft your edit request, taking care to place all phrases taken from sources into your own words. Please feel free to re-submit that edit request at your earliest convenience.

Reply 30-AUG-2019
I made some changes to the draft based on your feedback. I added two references to support the Niagara Health stats. I appreciate your help on editing my draft. Thank you.

Revised Draft

The Niagara Health System, or Niagara Health (NH) is a multi-site hospital amalgamation, comprising the following sites serving over 450,000 residents across the 12 municipalities making up the Regional Municipality of Niagara, Canada.


 * Douglas Memorial Site in Fort Erie
 * Greater Niagara General Site in Niagara Falls
 * Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls
 * Port Colborne Site
 * St. Catharines Site
 * Welland Site
 * Long-Term Care Home in Welland
 * Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St. Catharines

NH has more than 900 Acute Care, Complex Continuing Care, Mental Health, Long Term Care and Addiction Treatment beds. Several inpatient and outpatient clinics/services are provided across the sites. It is one of Ontario's largest hospital systems, with 4,800 employees, 600 physicians and 850 volunteers, with an annual operating budget of approximately $550 million.

History
Niagara Health is the result of a government directive, in 1999, to amalgamate the 8 hospital sites serving the Regional Municipality of Niagara. At that time, the St. Catharines community was served by the Shaver Hospital, for chronic care, the Hotel Dieu Hospital, a Catholic acute care facility managed by the Religious Hospitallers of St. Joseph, and the St. Catharines General Hospital. With amalgamation, the Hotel Dieu became part of Niagara Health, called the Ontario Street Site. Meanwhile, the Shaver was assumed by Hotel Dieu management and is now Hotel Dieu Shaver Health and Rehabilitation Centre.

In 2013, Niagara Health opened the St. Catharines Site, replacing the St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites. Cancer Care, Cardiac Care and an expanded Mental Health and Addictions Program are just a few of the new services provided in the Niagara Region.

The town of Niagara-on-the-Lake now owns the Niagara-on-the-Lake Site as of August 2018.

Edit request reply 30-AUG-2019
Thank you for your work at rephrasing the information, it is much appreciated. However, the rephrased portions of text are still strongly influenced by information which already exists on the Health System's own websites. Only a cursory attempt was made to rearrainge the main basic parts of information, as shown below:

This closeness in sentence structure and phrasing still closely parallels the information as it already exists at the Health System's website. It is not Wikipedia's purpose to mirror information which already exists. If there is difficulty in reproducing this information (primarily because the Health System's website already does a competent job of describing these relationships) then the only information brought over should be the minimum needed to convey the narrative. This ought to be done in an original way for the reader's benefit. This may be as simple as reproducing a timeline: Or if you prefer, it may be as complex as highlighting past and current relationships in a chart showing their structural relatedness:

Either way which is chosen would make fine additions to the article and would not sacrifice either the information being delivered or the manner in which it is delivered (by plagiarizing the source).
 * With regards to the intro lead section, a ref tag has been placed immediately after the name of the organization. Ref tags are not normally placed in the lead section.
 * With regards to the list of facilities, only a few have been given ref tags. It is also unclear if the proposal means for this list of facilities to be placed in the lead section. It would be better placed elsewhere.
 * The History section describes "new services" offered at certain facilities. The question of whether current hospital services should be described at all in Wikipedia pages notwithstanding, the use of a term such as "new" is discouraged per MOS:RELTIME.
 * With regards to the controversy section, the reason given for the proposed deletion was that the sources no longer exist. As the sources still exist under new URL's, that reason is unacceptable.
 * In conclusion, kindly reformulate your edit request so that it makes use of the strategies and suggestions listed above, and feel free to resubmit that edit request at your earliest convenience. Regards, Spintendo  07:35, 31 August 2019 (UTC)

Inquiry re Niagara Health System content
Good morning. I am the Communications Director at Niagara Health and hoping to connect with you regarding the content about the organization. We are concerned that it lists outdated information that could impact access and use of health services by members of the public in our community. For example, we no longer have a site in Niagara-on-the-Lake, and changes to sites announced in 2014 are no longer accurate. It would be appreciated if you could clarify for me how we go about updating the information in a way that appropriately meets your guidelines. We have attempted several times to make changes, and even information that is currently on your site is being rejected. Thank you in advance for your help with this important matter.

Ancobi (talk) 15:40, 4 September 2019 (UTC)


 * I find it strange that changes, such as updates like the ones you described, are being rejected. What are the changes you want to make? I see that the Niagara Health website does omit the NOTL site now, so I will try deleting it. Hopefully that works. Trappy (talk) 18:01, 4 September 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi Trappy. I listed below the changes I'm proposing. I broke it down in sections instead of providing you with the entire article.

Add to list of sites: Reason: We have 5 sites as well as three other locations that provide services to the community. A long-term care home in Welland, a satellite dialysis centre in Niagara Falls and a shared location for mental health and addictions with Canadian Mental Health Association in St. Catharines
 * Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls
 * Long-Term Care Home in Welland
 * Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St.Catharines

Update this paragraph to reflect 2018/2019 stats

Current: NH has almost 900 Acute Care, Complex Continuing Care, Mental Health, Long Term Care and Addiction Treatment beds. A wide range of inpatient and outpatient clinics/services are provided at the five sites. It is one of Ontario's largest hospital systems, with 4,154 employees, 599 physicians and 1,100 volunteers, with an annual operating budget of approximately $400 million.

New: NH has almost 900 Acute Care, Complex Continuing Care, Mental Health, Long Term Care and Addiction Treatment beds. A wide range of inpatient and outpatient clinics/services are provided at the sites. It is one of Ontario's largest hospital systems, with 4,800 employees, 600 physicians and 850 volunteers, with an annual operating budget of approximately $550 million.

'''This information is no longer accurate. There will be three hospitals providing services in Niagara:'''

Current: On January 13, 2014, Health Minister, Deb Matthews, announced that the Ontario government had adopted a recommendation to close 5 of Niagara Health's 6 hospitals. The region would be served by two large state-of-the-art facilities, the St. Catharines site and a new hospital in an as-yet-to-be-chosen location near Niagara Falls. The region would also will be served by two new urgent-care centres, or walk-in clinics.

New paragraph: Niagara Health is in the planning stages of the new South Niagara Hospital, to be located at the corners of Montrose and Lyons Creek roads in Niagara Falls, Ontario. It is being developed under the Ministry of Health’s 5-Stage Capital Planning Process. The current vision for the future calls for Niagara Health to evolve to three hospital sites (Niagara Falls, St. Catharines and Welland) and expand access to healthcare services in communities across Niagara.

HISTORY second paragraph

Current: With plans to eventually demolish the Ontario Street Site, which provided mostly acute-care in its new role, the St. Catharines Site grew in scope and importance. Plans to build a larger, more adequate facility in the city's west end, which required enough space to include a cancer treatment centre and mental health facility, were met with opposition by the community. Many deemed the location to be isolated and too far from the majority of Niagara residents. Hospital construction proceeded and the new building opened on March 24, 2013, replacing the St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites.

Proposed changes: In 2013, Niagara Health opened the one-million-square-foot St. Catharines Site, replacing the St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites. Thousands of local cancer, heart and mental health patients have access to new and expanded regional healthcare services in Niagara.

In 2018, the Town of Niagara-on-the-Lake assumed ownership of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Site. Niagara Health operates convalescent beds and provides other services in the town.

Remove Controversies

We are proposing to remove this section as the organization has dramatically changed since 2010. None of these items mentioned are an accurate reflection of the quality of care and organizational culture, they are misleading and in our view doing a disservice to users of Wikipedia, residents who access services and the team of 6,000 people who work at Niagara Health. We are not under censure, our MSA works closely with our leadership, and we are no longer under supervision.

Our current state is reflected as follows (some examples). We would be happy to provide an update to reflect these recent accomplishments.
 * Niagara Health is a Top 100 employer for Hamilton-Niagara
 * Niagara Health was recently recognized as a national leader in quality and safety, with 17 Leading Practices that other hospitals can use to improve quality and safety in their organizations
 * Niagara Health is accredited with exemplary standing
 * Niagara Health has recruited 165 specialist physicians over the last six years
 * We are the first Ontario hospital to introduce video technology that allows our emergency teams to partner with a regional children’s hospital to get immediate help for our youngest patients
 * Our research and academic mandate is strong and growing and is impacting health and wellbeing inside the hospital and outside its walls. For example, we work closely with more than 90 academic partners

Please let me know if you need any further information. --Ancobi (talk) 20:23, 19 September 2019 (UTC)

Edit Request
I'm looking to get some information updated on the Niagara Health System article page. The changes I'm purposing are broken down in four sections with referrences.

Add three other locations to list of sites: Reason: We have 5 sites as well as three other locations that provide services to the community. A long-term care home in Welland, a satellite dialysis centre in Niagara Falls and a shared location for mental health and addictions with Canadian Mental Health Association in St. Catharines
 * Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls
 * Long-Term Care Home in Welland
 * Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St.Catharines

'''Update the stats in this paragraph to reflect new 2018/2019 stats. The new stats are bolded'''

Current: NH has almost 900 Acute Care, Complex Continuing Care, Mental Health, Long Term Care and Addiction Treatment beds. A wide range of inpatient and outpatient clinics/services are provided at the five sites. It is one of Ontario's largest hospital systems, with 4,154 employees, 599 physicians and 1,100 volunteers, with an annual operating budget of approximately $400 million.

New: NH has almost 900 Acute Care, Complex Continuing Care, Mental Health, Long Term Care and Addiction Treatment beds. A wide range of inpatient and outpatient clinics/services are provided at the sites. It is one of Ontario's largest hospital systems, with 4,800 employees, 600 physicians and 850 volunteers, with an annual operating budget of approximately $550 million.

'''Last paragraph in the About section: This information is no longer accurate. There will be three hospitals providing services in Niagara:'''

Current: On January 13, 2014, Health Minister, Deb Matthews, announced that the Ontario government had adopted a recommendation to close 5 of Niagara Health's 6 hospitals. The region would be served by two large state-of-the-art facilities, the St. Catharines site and a new hospital in an as-yet-to-be-chosen location near Niagara Falls. The region would also will be served by two new urgent-care centres, or walk-in clinics.

Purposed paragraph: Niagara Health is in the planning stages of the new South Niagara Hospital, to be located at the corners of Montrose and Lyons Creek roads in Niagara Falls, Ontario. It is being developed under the Ministry of Health’s 5-Stage Capital Planning Process. The current vision for the future calls for Niagara Health to evolve to three hospital sites (Niagara Falls, St. Catharines and Welland) and expand access to healthcare services in communities across Niagara.

HISTORY second paragraph

Current: With plans to eventually demolish the Ontario Street Site, which provided mostly acute-care in its new role, the St. Catharines Site grew in scope and importance. Plans to build a larger, more adequate facility in the city's west end, which required enough space to include a cancer treatment centre and mental health facility, were met with opposition by the community. Many deemed the location to be isolated and too far from the majority of Niagara residents. Hospital construction proceeded and the new building opened on March 24, 2013, replacing the St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites.

Proposed changes: In 2013, Niagara Health opened the one-million-square-foot St. Catharines Site, replacing the St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites. Thousands of local cancer, heart and mental health patients have access to new and expanded regional healthcare services in Niagara.

In 2018, the Town of Niagara-on-the-Lake assumed ownership of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Site. Niagara Health operates convalescent beds and provides other services in the town.

Remove Controversies

We are proposing to remove this section as the organization has dramatically changed since 2010. None of these items mentioned are an accurate reflection of the quality of care and organizational culture, they are misleading and in our view doing a disservice to users of Wikipedia, residents who access services and the team of 6,000 people who work at Niagara Health. We are not under censure, our MSA works closely with our leadership, and we are no longer under supervision.

Our current state is reflected as follows (some examples). We would be happy to provide an update to reflect these recent accomplishments.
 * Niagara Health is a Top 100 employer for Hamilton-Niagara
 * Niagara Health was recently recognized as a national leader in quality and safety, with 17 Leading Practices that other hospitals can use to improve quality and safety in their organizations
 * Niagara Health is accredited with exemplary standing
 * Niagara Health has recruited 165 specialist physicians over the last six years
 * We are the first Ontario hospital to introduce video technology that allows our emergency teams to partner with a regional children’s hospital to get immediate help for our youngest patients
 * Our research and academic mandate is strong and growing and is impacting health and wellbeing inside the hospital and outside its walls. For example, we work closely with more than 90 academic partners

Please let me know if you need any further information. --Ancobi (talk) 13:21, 7 October 2019 (UTC)

Reply 8-OCT-2019
Below you will see where proposals from your request have been quoted with reviewer decisions and feedback inserted underneath, either accepting, declining or otherwise commenting upon your proposal(s). Please read the enclosed notes within the proposal review section below for information on each request. Spintendo 16:12, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Reply December 2, 2019
Thank you for making some of the changes. I noticed it says that Niagara Health has 8 sites, that is incorrect. Niagara Health has 5 hospital sites and 3 community-based locations. I'm proposing the following change to the first paragraph: The Niagara Health System, or Niagara Health (NH) is a multi-site hospital organization, comprised of five sites and three community-based locations, a long-term care home in Welland, a satellite dialysis centre in Niagara Falls and a shared location with Canadian Mental Health Association in St. Catharines for mental health and addictions programming. Niagara Health serves over 450,000 residents across the 12 municipalities making up the Regional Municipality of Niagara, Canada.

Under Facilities, can we change Mental Health and Addictions to Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St. Catharines The address is the name of the building.

Thank you. --Ancobi (talk) 18:56, 2 December 2019 (UTC)

Requesting Updates
I'm looking to update a couple of areas on this article. I noticed it says that Niagara Health has 8 sites, that is incorrect. Niagara Health has 5 hospital sites and 3 community-based locations. I'm proposing the following change to the first paragraph: The Niagara Health System, or Niagara Health (NH) is a multi-site hospital organization, comprised of five sites and three community-based locations, a long-term care home in Welland, a satellite dialysis centre in Niagara Falls and a shared location with Canadian Mental Health Association in St. Catharines for mental health and addictions programming. Niagara Health serves over 450,000 residents across the 12 municipalities making up the Regional Municipality of Niagara, Canada.

Under Facilities, can we change Mental Health and Addictions to Mental Health and Addictions at 264 Welland Ave., St. Catharines The address is the name of the building.

Thank you. --Ancobi (talk) 16:35, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Reply 24-DEC-2019

 * It isn't clear what is meant by the term "community based-location" and how a hospital doesn't fit into that term, so much so that the two separate items need to be dinstinctly mentioned. By my math, 5 hospital sites + 3 community based sites = 8 sites altogether. Please advise, keeping in mind that the nomenclature preferred by NHS may or may not be entirely the same as used by Wikipedia. When the two conflict, it's usually the case that Wikipedia's nomenclature is preferred — which invariably is whatever name or description is used by the majority of independent, reliable sources when discussing said term. Regards, Spintendo  18:15, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Reply 20-01-2020
The community-based services are referral only and the way they are listed currently on the Wikipedia page is confusing for some members of the public who may think they can go directly to one of those sites for care. The Long-term car site in Welland is part of the hospital building and technically not an additional site.

Can we change the first sentence in the article to reflect the five hospital sites: The Niagara Health System, or Niagara Health (NH) is a multi-site hospital amalgamation, comprising five sites serving over 450,000 residents across the 12 municipalities making up the Regional Municipality of Niagara, Canada.

Please let me know if you require any more information. Thank you. --Ancobi (talk) 19:38, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Request edit to one sentence
Hi, I'm looking for help to make the following changes to Niagara Health System article.

In the first sentence, is it possible to make the following edit to reflect the five hospital sites:

'''The Niagara Health System, or Niagara Health (NH) is a multi-site hospital amalgamation, comprising five sites serving over 450,000 residents across the 12 municipalities making up the Regional Municipality of Niagara, Canada. '''

The reason why I would liked this changed is because, Niagara Health has only 5 hospital sites. The community-based services listed under the Facilities section (Satellite Dialysis Centre in Niagara Falls; Long-Term Care Home in Welland; Mental Health and Addictions) are referral only and saying that Niagara Health has eight hospital sites on the article could be confusing for some members of the public who may think they can go directly to one of those locations for care. The Long-term car site in Welland is part of the hospital building and technically not an additional site.

Please let me know if you require any more information. Thank you. --Ancobi (talk) 18:42, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Reply 10-FEB-2020
Spintendo 20:51, 10 February 2020 (UTC)