ER doctors say this season is the worst they’ve ever seen, and are now calling for real action to fix the crisis plaguing Canada’s healthcare system.
ER doctors say this season is the worst they’ve ever seen, and are now calling for real action to fix the crisis plaguing Canada’s healthcare system.
I would have to suspect if they haven’t already reduced hours or closed the facility it’s in small towns. They often can’t find enough staff so they close down and residents then need to make drives to the next major city to get treatment.
Often this involves multiple hour drives on icy and snow covered roads this time of year.
That said in the greater Vancouver area it’s not uncommon to wait 8+ hours in the ER for less severe cases. Often the ERs become overflow for drop in clinics that cannot handle the volumes.
Often the ER is the stopping place for those needing prescription renewals too as GPs (if one has one) can be 3-6 weeks out for bookings and I’m told there’s a mismatch to the renewal length maximums.
Ideally, never get sick, old, or need meds and there’s no issues… /s
8 hours to be seen is possible in greater Vancouver, but definitely not typical. Current wait times are about as bad as they’ve ever been, but avg wait times are still about 1 to 4 hours. I think it’s the rural hospitals that get really bad.
I’m really sorry to hear that the situation in BC is bad.
I’ll consider myself really lucky to have had many ER visits in my life (me, my kids, etc.) and not having to wait more than 5 hours, even when the ER is super full. Broke my arm during the pandemic, and I don’t think it was more than 2 hours in and out, x-rays and all!
Are people going to your ERs for minor things? Colds, flus, etc.? I’ve been in emergency rooms where it’s hard to tell who’s the patient and who’s the family waiting for them. No visible pain or injuries, etc… I can only imagine non-emergencies can really clog the system up, too.
That’s wild. Walk-in clinic doctors can often prescribe meds. If it’s a matter of waiting for your GP to renew them, that’s something you take up with your pharmacy, not the ER!
There are so many levels of care before needing the ER, and I wonder if just a ton of people make the ER their first stop, even when they don’t have/need to.
In years past I’ve had shorter wait times due to late night injuries from sports or hockey. I’ve always driven to smaller hospitals on the edges of town.
I’m not sure today how quickly that would go. A couple of years ago I broke a bone in my foot during a road trip in northern BC. They treated me in a small town were I was the only patient that day. I was treated by a GP and Nurse on a 2 week rotation from Saskatoon as there was no BC doctors for this small town. They didn’t have the air cast I needed but told me I could deal with that at my ER when I get home to Vancouver.
A week later when I got home I spent 8 hours one day at the local ER before I left due to a crazy medial situation that was erupting in the ER that I felt uncomfortable with, then the next day when I returned it was another 4+ hours waiting to see a doctor for the cast. Then I was able to get a referral to a specialist from there.
Most people would prefer to go to a drop in clinic before ERs but often the clinics are full for the day by the first hour they are open. There’s limits on how many patients they can see. If you have a illness many can’t wait the 2-4 weeks it takes to see a family GP so the walk in clinics (which are becoming more by appointment only) become that next stop before the catch all of the ER. I can’t imagine the BS those sick that need a note for work from a Doctor do.
I had a minor surgery in the summer. There was minor complications afterwards. It was 2 weeks before I could even do a phone consult with the family GP and then the walk in clinics were full. I was lucky to have one of the local clinics have me to wait around at the end of the day to see if they could squeeze me in to tend to my bandage issues. If they didn’t I was looking at a 2-3 day game of trying to find a clinic each morning.
In Vancouver I know someone that went to a thing called “Urgent Care” on a Sunday to get meds for her senior mother that had covid. The urgent care was there to take the load off the ER. After waiting 3 hours in there to see a healthcare person they were told they don’t issue prescriptions there and they would need to go to the ER for the prescription which was another long wait. It’s a good thing she wasn’t too sick /s.
There are issues with the timing of prescriptions, how far out they can be issued, and combined with the time frames it can take to see your GP many end up at the ER as a stop gap measure especially seniors if they lose track of their prescriptions.
There are also huge issues with nurses/care aids doing home care. Often there aren’t enough and seniors that rely on them for in home care need to wait for a day or two extra for those visits when there is enough staff. I saw this with my senior family members first hand just before Covid.
I fear it’s going to get worse before it gets better from here.
What a nightmare! I wonder what Ontario is doing that BC isn’t, because that doesn’t sound like healthcare to me!