Trail enters 2026 with new community health centre<\/p>\n
Published 2:00 pm Monday, December 29, 2025<\/p>\n
(Editor\u2019s note: This story is part of a year-end series reviewing notable local developments from 2025 as the community looks ahead to 2026.)<\/p>\n
Trail closed out 2025 with a significant addition to its health-care landscape, as the Lower Columbia Community Health Centre officially opened in September, expanding access to team-based primary care in the Lower Columbia.<\/p>\n
Located at 106\u20131101 Dewdney Ave., the centre is expected to eventually connect more than 7,200 patients with a family doctor or nurse practitioner once it reaches full capacity.<\/p>\n
The non-profit facility, operated by the Lower Columbia Community Health Centre Society, is part of the Kootenay Boundary primary care network and was developed to address long-standing gaps in local access to primary care.<\/p>\n
Following a soft opening July 21, the centre hired about 10 full-time-equivalent staff, including family physicians, nurse practitioners, social workers and community health workers.<\/p>\n
An open house on Sept. 20 marked its broader launch.<\/p>\n
Executive director Rita MacLeod said the centre was built on years of local volunteer effort and collaboration.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur team is already providing accessible, responsive and individualized care,\u201d MacLeod said at the time.<\/p>\n
The centre is slated to grow to nearly 18 full-time-equivalent clinical staff, plus relief workers and leadership positions. Provincial funding includes more than $2 million in startup support, with $1.63 million committed annually for operations.<\/p>\n
As the calendar turns to 2026, the clinic stands as a sign of progress in a region that has struggled with access to primary care.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Trail enters 2026 with new community health centre Published 2:00 pm Monday, December 29, 2025 (Editor\u2019s note: This…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":378041,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,84,392],"class_list":{"0":"post-378040","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=378040"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/378040\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/378041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=378040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=378040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=378040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}