To be eligible to be approved as a Participant in ClinicalConnect, healthcare organizations (including Sole Practitioners) must be a Health Information Custodian (HIC), and comply with the ClinicalConnect Terms & Conditions.

Background: Physicians and Nurse Practitioners, who provide healthcare independently/operate a private practice, can apply for access to ClinicalConnect as a Sole Practitioner Health Information Custodian Participant. ClinicalConnect provides electronic access to your patients’ health information from all acute care hospitals, regional cancer programs and Ontario Health atHome services in south west Ontario, plus the following provincial data repositories for those who have the necessary agreement(s) in place with Ontario Health:

•    Acute and Community Care Clinical Data Repository (acCDR) consolidates patient data across selected hospitals and Ontario Health atHome services. Learn more here.
•    Diagnostic Imaging Common Service (DI Common Service) provides access to diagnostic images and corresponding reports from hospitals and independent health facilities. Learn more here.
•    Digital Health Drug Repository (DHDR) includes data and information from Ontario publicly-funded drugs and pharmacy services including Ontario Drug Benefits (ODB), OHIP+, Narcotics Monitoring System (NMS). Learn more here. 
•    Ontario Laboratories Information System (OLIS) provides access to lab test orders and results from hospitals, community labs and public health labs. Learn more here.

Did you know? Using ClinicalConnect and eConsult together works well to optimize patient care! Learn more. 

Important Information Prior to Submitting Your Participation Agreement:

1. You must have a ONE ID credential when applying as a Sole Practitioner Participant, and you'll be asked to enter your ONE ID username in Part 5 of the Agreement. If you don’t already have a ONE ID account:

• Physicians: Visit the The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario’s (CPSO) website to register for a ONE ID account (and at the same time, you'll be prompted to review and agree to the Ontario Health Physician Agreement, required to be able to view data from provincial data repositories using ClinicalConnect). You can review the ONE ID CPSO Registration Guide on the Ontario Health website for more information about registering for a ONE ID credential and the Physician Agreement.

• Nurse Practitioners: If you don’t already have a ONE ID credential/account, please enter N/A into the Participation Agreement and a representative from our Office will contact you to facilitate the account creation.

2.  As outlined in section 13 of the ClinicalConnect Terms & Conditions, you will be required to provide a copy of your Statement of Protection from the Canadian Medical Protective Association (for Physicians), or your Professional Liability Protection from the Canadian Nurses Protective Society (for Nurse Practitioners); other forms of liability coverage/insurance cannot be accepted for Sole Practitioner applicants. If you have questions about your coverage, email info@HITSeHealth.ca to connect with an onboarding team member.  

3.  In Part 2 of the Participation Agreement, the location(s)/office(s) where you're seeking approval to use ClinicalConnect at must be listed as Practice Locations on your profile that's publicly available on your Regulated Health College’s website (CPSO or CNO). Please ensure your profile is up to date prior to submitting the Agreement.

4. In Part 6 of the Participation Agreement, you will be asked to choose if you want to be able to provision ClinicalConnect access for your private practice staff who work under your authority. By selecting Yes, you'll be provided instructions on how to complete a ~20-minute eLearning module that explains how you'll use an ancillary, web-based system to create ClinicalConnect accounts for private practice staff, so they can assist you in the delivery of healthcare to your patients. By selecting No, you will not be able to provision ClinicalConnect accounts for your private practice staff however, this selection can be updated in the future by the approved Sole Practitioner emailing support@clinicalconnect.ca, and instructions to complete the eLearning module referred to above will be provided at that time. 

Next Steps When Ready to Apply to Become a Sole Practitioner in ClinicalConnect:

Step 1: When you are ready and have time to complete the Participation Agreement in its entirety (estimated time requirement is 10 minutes), you may begin your submission online by clicking here: Participation Agreement for Sole Practitioners. If you are not sure what information to enter in the Agreement, a Tip Sheet for Sole Practitioners is available by clicking here.

Step 2: Your Participation Agreement will be reviewed by the ClinicalConnect Program Office. Assuming requirements thus far are met, you will be emailed the Sole Practitioner Attestation to complete. To preview the content of the Attestation, please click here, noting that only the fillable PDF version emailed to you will be accepted as part of your application. You are required to return the Sole Practitioner Attestation within 30 calendar days of receipt. 

Please be advised that by this stage, the ClinicalConnect Program Office, on your behalf, will have submitted some entries from your Participation Agreement (Step 1) to Ontario Health; this information is used to assess your eligibility to be authorized to view data from the provincial repositories listed above. As such, a representative of the ClinicalConnect Program Office will contact you directly to to complete Ontario Health’s Client Information Form (CIF), which may be followed by agreement(s) being sent to you by Ontario Health as required.

Step 3: Your Sole Practitioner Attestation will be reviewed by the ClinicalConnect Program Office. If approved as a Participant and if you indicated in your Participation Agreement that you want to be able to provision ClinicalConnect access for your staff, you will be emailed instructions to complete a short (~20 minute), one-time, Sole Practitioner eLearning module. This eLearning module serves as a reminder of your obligations as a Participant in ClinicalConnect, and provides instructions on how you will be able to use the Access Governance System to create, manage and attest ClinicalConnect accounts for your office staff. If you chose not to be able to provision access for your staff, you'll move onto Step 4 below. 

Step 4: Once your eLearning module is complete (if applicable) and account configuration details from Ontario Health have been received by the ClinicalConnect Program Office, you will be notified by email that your access to both ClinicalConnect (including provincial data repositories, if applicable), and the Access Governance System (for staff account management, if applicable), has been enabled.