Everyday Heroes Kids: How Canadian Families are Fighting to Get Healthcare for their Children
There are many challenges and disparities faced by families when accessing care in our fragmented system. In order to create a more seamless experience, innovative solutions must continue to be supported by the Government of Canada and ecosystem collaborators.
Children’s Healthcare Canada states that, “If we could transform the system of health and services to be more accessible and easier to navigate, that would be the most profound change we could make.”
The problems we have today are not cyclical in nature and what we are going to see in the coming years are things we have never seen before: mental health challenges rising at epidemic rates, one in five children have a learning disability, Autism diagnoses increased by 70% over last decade and an estimated 1.5M new immigrants to Canada in the next 3 years.
As Canadians, we need to think in a pre-emptive manner, not in a reactive manner – this is the cost-effective way. Everyday Heroes Kids (EHKids), a free online community, is trying to accomplish a transformational change to our healthcare system – right injustices and improve access to care for even the most remote populations or those with the least access to care.
“Although these providers are exceptional performers, boundaries and barriers to proper care are created by a lack of integration, and children and families are left to integrate their care on their own.” – SickKids 5 Year Strategy 2015-2020
Finding the Right Professional at the Right Time Can be Life Changing for a Child
Tammany Petrie is a mom of 2 sons, one born profoundly deaf and her other son diagnosed with ADHD. As a former SickKids parent mentor volunteer and the advocate for her own children, Tammany experienced first-hand the challenges
Tammany founded Everyday Heroes Kids after frustrations trying to find professionals to help her kids. Searching online gave the same few names over and over across Canada. More resources existed but couldn’t be found!
Knowing families deserved better, Tammany’s team spent 2 years developing a solution at St. Michael’s Hospital’s accelerator.
In 2020, they launched EHKids. It connects families to profiles of health and mental health professionals and organizations. EHKids improves access to all the resources parents need, even ones unknown. The goal is earlier intervention, saving time, money and stress.
The Sector began assisting EHK in 2020 through its Investment Readiness Program. This enabled EHK to expand its platform, generate revenue and access social finance. The Sector provided expert guidance on EHK’s Theory of Change and impact measurement.
The Sector sees EHK’s potential for significant medical impact on children. It could positively transform Canada’s healthcare system as a social enterprise.
Connecting Care, Canada-Wide with Everyday Heroes Kids
Currently, parents/caregivers struggle to find professionals, especially for the first time. The process is slow, heightening concern, stress, unknowns, and fear.
Everyday Heroes Kids solves access to kids’ care and accessibility for professionals. It reduces time to connect children who need care with the right professional. Faster connections improve outcomes for all.
Their current roadmap priorities are to increase the number of professionals and organizations on the platform, raise awareness among families and to improve on their existing desktop application (before investing in an app) in order to extend their reach and impact across Canada.
The Bottom Line
EHK makes an innovative request for your support to transform healthcare in a way many NPOs desire. This sends a message of real change that people can feel – not just talk about.
Since its launch, Everyday Heroes Kids gained support from the Government of Canada, pediatric hospitals, NPOs, professionals, sponsors like Rogers Communications and Cochlear Canada, and national features. The platform now includes over 1,000 professionals and organizations. Users have performed over 140,000 searches.
Everyday Heroes Kids, supported by The Sector has been able to get past the proof of concept stage and establish a strong foundation to support the pediatric community. However, they are looking for ecosystem partners to help prove the impact EHKids is capable of on a national scale and ensure they can continue to deliver this free service to families across Canada and break through to that higher level.
Their team has done the leg work and have taken it to this point. We all know it is a problem, and now they need the right ecosystem collaborators/change agents around them to make this come to fruition so that we can ensure kids in need of care receive the care they need.
“Canada ranks the poorest for Children’s health and well-being outcomes of the countries with strong economic, environment and social systems.” – UNICEF Canada
