Alberta Health and Wellness’ implemented the "Umbrella Alberta Primary Health Care Project" from 1998-2001, with the goal of improving primary health care practices and informing the development of primary health care policy.

Under the Umbrella Project, with funding from Health Canada's Health Transition Fund (HTF), 27 major Primary Health Care demonstration and evaluation projects were implemented and evaluated in Alberta between 1998 and 2000. Most were implemented by the province’s regional health authorities (RHAs). The projects provided an opportunity to implement new ways of providing primary health services.

The types of funded primary health care projects included:

• evaluation of existing activities/models/approaches;

• enhancement of existing activities/models/approaches; and

• implementation and evaluation of new demonstration projects.

Independent evaluation and sharing key learning and evidence was an integral component of this initiative. As in all other projects funded by the HTF across Canada, data collected related to six national dimensions of inquiry:

• access to services

• quality of services

• integration of services

• impact on populations

• cost-effectiveness

• transferability

A project team report and an independent evaluation report was developed for each of the 27 funded projects. An extensive series of publications and a video were developed (see Resource link above to access these publications) to share this learning across Alberta and Canada, as well as a showcase conference held in Calgary on Nov. 21-22, 2000.

Funding Announcement - Primary Health Care Transition fund - Provincial Stanford Chronic Disease Self-Management Leader Training Program - June 2005