(rdnewsNOW file photo)

By Josh Hall (Twitter: @Vancan19) and Sheldon Spackman

"extreme pressure," says doctor

Patient dies in Red Deer emergency room day after wait times peak at 14 hours

Jan 25, 2022 | 5:53 PM

In the early morning hours of Saturday, Jan. 22, the emergency room wait time at Red Deer Regional Hospital Centre (RDRHC) peaked at over 14 hours.

A day later, Alberta Health Services (AHS) confirms, a patient died in the emergency department after being triaged and later reassessed by staff. The patient was waiting for further care, AHS shares, adding the ER was fully staffed at the time.

AHS says it doesn’t know if the death was a direct result of wait times.

“Our thoughts are with this patient’s family, friends and loved ones,” the health authority says in a statement. “Our thoughts are also with our emergency department physicians and staff, and we will continue to provide all available support to the individuals and the site.”

During Tuesday’s live COVID update, Health Minister Jason Copping was asked about the death.

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“My heart goes out to the family and anyone who’s passed away in our system. I don’t have all the details … I know we’re taking this matter very seriously and I’ve asked AHS for a report,” he said, noting a government plan laid out last week to provide additional surge capacity at hospitals province-wide.

“As Dr. (Verna) Yiu [AHS president & CEO] indicated last week, we’re bringing on board nursing students, and we’ve hired, over the last two years, hundreds of nurses into the system. We recognize it’s a challenging time, but we’re going to continue to focus on providing the best care for Alberta patients as we get through it.”

DOCTORS SOUNDING THE ALARM

Meantime, doctors are once again sounding the alarm — thanks to the aforementioned more than half-day wait time — stating that AHS and the government cannot wait any longer before providing some help to RDRHC.

Dr. Kym Jim, internal medicine specialist and RDRHC nephrologist, and Society for Hospital Expansion in Central Alberta (SHECA) spokesperson, says the hospital has been under extreme pressure, especially over the last 7-10 days.

“There are a lot of resource problems related to the pandemic, but the reality is that Red Deer had resource and bed problems long before the pandemic,” says Jim, noting SHECA’s upcoming fifth anniversary.

“It’s always been about resources, beds, emergency wait times, technologies we should have, but don’t. All those issues remain outstanding as we await a government announcement on expansion.”

Jim states, as he has in the past, that hospital services expansion was needed 15 years ago.

“We need resources now. A new hospital is still years away from even starting construction,” he says, emphasizing there are options to help.

“We need an understanding from government and AHS that we need a budget to start implementing things. There’ve been many proposals and programs put forth which go beyond the hospital expansion business case that’s sitting with government right now.”

Patients who are residents of Red Deer are frequently shipped to health centres in outlying communities, Jim laments.

“They receive great care, but it’s still reflective of the fact that Red Deer and central Alberta do not have enough resources here to serve the patients of Central Zone,” he says. “We’re also seeing delays in transfers out, and then delays in receiving patients from outlying sites, because we don’t have enough ambulances. The whole system is under strain.”

Dr. Keith Wolstenholme, an orthopedic surgeon at RDRHC, describes the situation as “classic bedlock” that the hospital has dealt with for years.

“We can’t shuffle patients out from the emergency department who should get a bed upstairs, and that means new patients in the emergency department can’t get into emergency department stretchers,” he says, noting a shortage of anesthesiologists and operating room nurses.

Wolstenholme says expansion ‘s delay is resulting in substandard care.

READ MORE: Red Deer Regional Hospital dealing with anesthesiologist shortage

“A separate issue is very long, unprecedented wait times for scheduled surgeries. I’m telling day surgery patients they’ll wait a year, or if it’s a knee surgery, two years.”

GOV’T & HEALTH OFFICIALS RESPOND TO CRISIS

AHS says approximately 90 per cent of average weekly surgical volumes are currently being delivered provincially, with lower volumes in Red Deer largely due to staff/physician isolation.

AHS also addressed the excessive wait times, explaining that on Saturday morning, multiple trauma cases presented at the ER in a short period.

“While the estimated wait times did briefly display approximately 14 hours, the actual average wait time for care for patients with less urgent needs on January 22 was three hours and 43 minutes. Staffing was normal in the emergency department over the weekend,” AHS says.

“We understand that waiting for admission is challenging, and can be very frustrating. Every effort is being made to reduce capacity pressures and admit patients as soon as possible. One of the ways we’re working to address capacity concerns is transferring stable patients to another healthcare facility if needed.”

During Tuesday’s COVID update, rdnewsNOW brought up the wait times with Minister Copping, asking what he’s doing to ensure construction on an expansion project starts as soon as possible.

“We fully understand the need for increased infrastructure within the Central Zone and Red Deer. Work is being done on that, I can tell you. I can’t tell you anything further,” the minister began. “Decisions will be made over the coming weeks in terms of what projects will go ahead in the budget. We are aware that there’s an infrastructure deficit there, and as you indicated, work has been ongoing in terms of ‘How do we address that?’

rdnewsNOW followed up, asking the minister his thoughts when hearing doctors’ accounts of “extreme” pressure and “substandard” care.

“Our focus of our government and AHS is (to) provide equitable health care across the entire province. We understand that there’s been a request, and quite frankly, a need for infrastructure in Red Deer,” he said. “We’ve had a number of conversations like that, and again, work has been ongoing in that regard. We’ll be able to say more hopefully in the coming weeks.”

In 2020, Premier Jason Kenney announced $100 million for Red Deer hospital expansion.

Last year, the UCP’s capital budget and plan included $5 million for hospital expansion, plus a commitment for another $19 million in 2022, and $35 million in 2023 – a grand total of $59 million over three years.

The provincial budget is slated for Feb. 24.