Dr. Alena Russo, chiropractor and owner of Russo Family Chiropractic in Downtown Brampton, faced the same challenges that many small healthcare clinics across Ontario have during the pandemic.
The need to provide important care must always be balanced with the need to ensure the safety of both patients and staff. To that end, Russo Family Chiropractic has worked to balance in-person care with supporting patients at home where possible.
Dr. Alena also turned to the Digital Main Street (DMS) program to take her clinic digital. This included implementing a new paperless charting, billing and scheduling system that is compliant with Canada’s Personal Health Information Protection Act (PHIPA).
The local DMS Digital Service Squad has also helped Dr. Alena boost her website visits from Google Search and from Instagram and Facebook, by increasing the frequency and the regularity of her social media posting, complete with new photos, videos and virtual treatments.
“DMS has been instrumental in helping to create an online presence for my business,” Dr. Alena said. “I have received so much positive feedback from my patients about the ease of booking online, and personally find it so much easier to be on a paperless system. Now more than ever, it’s important to think outside the box and be creative. I am fortunate enough to have the means to do this with the help of Digital Main Street, and I cannot thank them enough for kick-starting this initiative for me and my business.”
The Digital Main Street program has been further extended through funding from FedDev Ontario and the Ontario Ministry for Economic Development, Job Creation and Trade (MEDJCT). The new round of funding includes $42.5 million from the Government of Canada’s Regional Relief and Recovery Fund, a national recovery initiative delivered by Canada’s regional development agencies. With $7.45 million from Ontario, this combined federal and provincial project will strengthen Ontario’s economic capacity for innovation, entrepreneurship and collaboration, and will promote the development of a strong and diversified Ontario economy. For more information, please visit digitalmainstreet.ca/ontariogrants