The chair of the Sydenham District Hospital (SJH) board says he's surprised that plans to disband the current tri-board system for the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance have been made public.
The boards at Public General Hospital (PGH) and St. Joseph's Hospital (SJH) in Chatham say they have notified the Sydenham board that they intend to separate from the Wallaceburg site.
Sydenham board chair Sheldon Parsons says he was under the impression that those discussions were to be kept secret.
"There have been ongoing discussion between the three boards with regard to the future of the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance," says Parsons. "But that discussion was labelled as confidential by the other two boards and we have been honouring that label of confidentiality."
Parsons adds that he's not sure how making the information public helps the situation.
"There are many confidential issues that need to be discussed if the future is to dissolution as opposed to reconciliation," says Parsons. "We said let's sit down, let's work through this, let's resolve it... The other two boards chose not to follow that route and they're the ones that are steering the ship right now, so we'll have to see where they want to steer it."
Parsons says the Sydenham board is currently receiving legal advice as to how to proceed.
