Our Impact
Better care happens when we improve it together.
For more than five years, Healthcare Excellence Canada (HEC) has worked alongside healthcare organizations, patients, caregivers, communities and partners to improve healthcare across Canada. Together, we’re helping what works reach more people and more places, while building the conditions for safer, higher-quality and more equitable care.
Explore the stories and partnerships that demonstrate our collective impact and how together we are helping shape the future of healthcare.
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Five years at a glance
7 million+
people within reach of better care
94%
of settings implemented targeted practice or behaviour change
97%
of settings developed characteristics known to sustain improvement
Five years of collective impact
Since 2021, HEC has worked with partners across the country to accelerate improvement by connecting people, evidence and practical support.
Over the last five years, we’ve helped organizations adapt proven approaches, strengthen improvement capability and create lasting change across Canada’s healthcare system
Today, independent evaluation confirms that this approach is making a difference. Many partners said these improvements would have taken significantly longer or not happened at all without HEC. Read the independent evaluation.
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Impact in action
Discover stories of collaboration, innovation and lived experience that show how improvement happens – and what others can learn from it.
Finding hope and connection while living with dementia at home
When Dave was diagnosed with dementia, the progressive disease felt isolating for him and his wife, Cindy. Finding specialized support in rural Saskatchewan was difficult, until they discovered the Dementia Friendly Life Enrichment Program by SaskAbilities, the only in-person support program in their rural Saskatchewan region.
The program pairs Dave with a facilitator for outings, while giving Cindy guidance to alleviate caregiver burnout.
“This program is helping Dave stay home longer.”
— Cindy
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Health Equity Framework
“The experience of co-developing the HEC Health Equity Framework has shown me firsthand that value-based action is integral to drive change. It has reshaped the way I engage with staff and how I think about health policy. I suspect the positive impact of this framework will be felt for years to come.”
– Jocelyn Adams, Executive Director, Gender Affirming Care PE
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Bringing comfort through connection to improve resident well-being
At Victoria Glen Manor in New Brunswick, the team prioritizes human connection. Guided by the Appropriate Use of Antipsychotics Toolbox, staff use non-pharmacological approaches like music, art and pet therapy to build person-centred care plans.
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Embedding the foundations of quality, safety and equity across all our work
This series not only strengthened my knowledge and understanding; it has challenged me to think differently. It has further grounded my work and strengthened my ability to support leaders in moving from intention to action and to go beyond traditional approaches toward ones shaped by lived experience, shared accountability, in service of more equitable, person-centred and safer care.”
– Christina Denysek, Coach
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Our paths to impact
Lasting change doesn’t happen through one program or project. It happens by identifying what works, supporting organizations to adapt and spread proven approaches and measuring the difference those improvements make.
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We help what works reach more people and more places
We do this through various programs and initiatives, including collaboratives, challenges and awards. They support shared learning and spread effective approaches across the system.
Sustaining change takes more than good ideas — it takes people with the skills, confidence and support to lead it.
Enabling teams to have the skills, confidence and support to lead and sustain change. We do this through leadership development programs, online and in-person learning programs, and practical tools and frameworks.
We convene people, evidence and lived experience to inform policies and practices that enable better care.
By bringing people, evidence and lived experience together we help shape systems that enable safer, higher-quality care. We do this by creating spaces where evidence, lived experience and system leadership come together. This happens through national and regional networks, collaboratives and policy-focused activities.
We evaluate our work, learn alongside our partners and share what works so improvements continue to spread across Canada’s healthcare system. We also track progress using four key measures that show how our strategy is working in practice to move Care Forward:
Expanding access to care and easing pressure on emergency departments
Helping more people age where they call home
Advancing safe, person-centred long-term care
Supporting the health workforce
Explore all reports and evaluations
2025-26 Impact Report: Forward, Together
PDF (10 MB)2024-25 Impact Report: Care that Counts
PDF (5 MB)2023-24 Impact Report: Building Momentum, Sustaining Impact
PDF (10 MB)2022-23 Impact Report: With and For
PDF (10 MB)2021-22 Impact Report: Partnering Meaningfully
PDF (4 MB)2020-21 Healthcare Excellence Canada Annual Report
PDF (628 KB)2021-25 Healthcare Excellence Canada Independent Evaluation
PDF (525 KB)
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