Recently we’ve had two interesting opportunities to reconnect with some of the athletes. On the first occasion we met Clara Hughes at The Green Living Showin Toronto in April where she was a prominent guest speaker.

She was dynamic, excited, very well prepared and spoke easily to a rapt audience of several hundred people for more than an hour armed with an excellent video of the Games events in which she participated. After her talk she signed autographs for a large crowd of interested spectators.

On the second occasion Scotia McLeod hosted an evening with Becky Keller – 4 time Olympic medal-winning hockey player, wife, mother of two – and an MBA grad!

Its ten weeks since we returned from the Vancouver Olympics and the spirit is still high. Both recent events were packed with keen patrons of all ages. The Scotia event was smaller, more intimate, yet you could have heard a pin drop during Becky’s talk – except for the erupting laughter at her humorous accounts of training camp life.

Like Clara Hughes, Becky began her talk with video highlights of the Vancouver Games themselves along with excellent footage from her own Women’s Hockey events. It was heartening to see the excitement and the Olympic spirit that was still tangible in both venues. It was wonderful to see how well prepared the athletes were for their speaking engagements. Both video presentations were very professionally put together and the athletes themselves both warm and generous to their audiences and professionally well prepared for their gigs.

With today’s naming of John Furlong as Volunteer Chairman of the Own the Podium Advisory Board, things look good for Canadian athletes in London in 2012 and Sochi in 2014. Maybe they need volunteers in the polyclinics!

One of the reasons I was very excited about my volunteer assignment in the Polyclinic in the Athletes Village was the opportunity to really experience inter-professional practice in action.

It has been many years since I practiced clinical nursing and worked side by side with other health professionals in the field. Here was the chance to experience this in 2010, and in a setting where many health professionals are actively working together collaboratively to meet individual patient needs.

Like other health professionals in the field today, I use terms like inter-professional practice, collaboration and team work regularly and often discuss the actualities of important current concepts like patient-focused care. This seemed like an awesome opportunity to experience the realities of what many might call “lingo”.

When my assignment first came to me in an e-mail last August I wasn’t even sure what a polyclinic was – I had to look it up on Wikipedia. A polyclinic, it said, is a place where a wide range of health care services, including diagnostics, can be obtained without the need for an overnight stay. Polyclinics are sometimes co-located within a hospital or can be located completely separated from the hospital. A typical Polyclinic houses general medical practitioners such as doctors and nurses who provide ambulatory care along with some acute care services, but lacks the major surgical and pre- and post operative care facilities commonly associated with hospitals.

Apparently polyclinics are popular in countries such as Australia, France, Germany, Switzerland and the former Soviet republics such as Russia and Ukraine and in many countries across Asia and Africa. It is said that recent Russian governments have attempted to replace the polyclinic model, which was introduced during soviet times, with a more western model but this has failed.

The concept of the polyclinic is a good fit with the current North American movement towards stronger inter-professional practice involving a wide variety of specialized practitioners and more focus on health and wellness than on illness care. In the last few years hospital units have become more like intensive care units with sicker and sicker patients requiring 24/7 care taking up available space. Hospitals are busier than ever, budgets are tight and the need for other models of care is high. The idea of community polyclinics seems valid.

Last night was my first evening at the Polyclinic. It’s beginning to feel really comfortable. Lots of fantastic people many from BC, others from all over North America. I worked with 3 nurses – 2 young fellows from Edmonton and another from the Royal Columbian here in Vancouver. All have taken their vacation to volunteer here for 3 weeks. They are all computer savyy so we get things organized together.

The sports med doc was from Minneapolis, loves volunteering at the Olympics. He has 3 young kids at home so he’s only here for a week. The other doc is from Quebec. We saw a steady stream of walk-in people until about 9pm and after that dead quiet. There’s lots of chat about where people are from and why they chose to do this.

I’m beginning to better understand the concept of a Polyclinic. Wikipedia says that a polyclinic is a place where a wide range of health care services (including diagnostics) can be obtained without the need for an overnight stay. Polyclinics are sometimes co-located with a hospital or may be located in another locality entirely. A typical polyclinic houses health practitioners such as doctors and nurses and provides ambulatory care and some acute care services but lacks the major surgical and pre- and post operative care facilities commonly associated with hospitals. Apparently polyclinics have existed for 10 or more years in Australia, France, Germany, Switzerland and the former Soviet republics such as Russia and Ukraine; and in many countries across Asia and Africa.

In this Olympic Polyclinic working alongside nurses and doctors are volunteer physios, massage therapists, chiropractors, optometrists, and dentists. As well we have lab, pharmacy, Xray, MRI, and CT scanning – all staffed with volunteers. Multi professional services are provided to the athletes and their entourage, IOC and NOC members and their families and the workforce which consists of hundreds of volunteers who are stationed in the Village. There is no hierarchy. The culture is very respectful of everyone’s expertise and the tone is highly collaborative.

This is a fantastic opportunity to see inter-professional care in action. I intend to watch carefully.