Health Regions: Boundaries and Correspondence with Census Geography, September 2024

This issue describes in detail the health region boundaries as of September 2024 and their correspondence with the 2021 and 2016 Census geography. Health regions are defined by the provinces and represent administrative areas or regions of interest to health authorities. This product contains correspondence files (linking health regions to census geographic codes) and boundary files. User documentation provides an overview of health regions, sources, methods, limitations and product description (file format and layout).

What’s New?

• Nova Scotia retained the name and code of its four health regions (HRs). However, it introduced changes to the HRs boundaries, prompting the need for dissemination block splits.
• Statistics Canada updated the schema of the dissemination geography unique identifier (DGUID) codes from A0008 to A0085 for all six Ontario Health Regions (OHR).
  • For more information, please visit the Dissemination Geography Unique Identifier: Definition and Structure website for details about the DGUID structure, a list of schema codes and their associated geographic areas. (Please note that this page has not yet been updated with the new codes “A0085” and “A0089”, as defined above).
• Saskatchewan modified the names of all seven health regions by adding a zone designation (e.g., Far North became Far North Zone).
• British Columbia revised the boundaries and attributes of its health regions, assigning the five regional Health Authorities to health regions. The 16 Health Service Delivery Areas (HSDAs), previously designated as Health Regions, are now classified as sub-geographies within the Health Authorities.

For detailed information about changes to health regions’ code attributes and names, see Appendix 1 Summary of changes to health regions, 2023 and 2024.