News that wait times at Alberta hospitals are on the downswing is good news for patients, their families and health-care providers – and perhaps proof that the general public can sometimes still have an impact on government action.
Last week, Alberta Health Services announced that wait times in many hospitals have dropped off in recent days, reversing a troubling trend that had been building over the past several years.
Concern voiced by residents across the province over increasing wait times in emergency rooms last fall and early this year prompted Alberta Health Services to implement steps to address those worries.
Those measures included a number of good investments in the vital health system provincewide:
• Adding 1,300 continuing care beds by the end of March, additional capacity AHS says has allowed the freeing up of hospital beds currently occupied by patients whose health needs are better served in a long-term care facility or a supportive living environment.
• Adding 360 new hospital beds by the end of March. Those beds include surge capacity beds, as well as transition beds, detox beds, hospice beds, and Medical Assessment Units that reduce pressures in emergency departments.
• Informing patients about their care options because, Alberta Health said, some health needs are best met in places other than a hospital emergency department, places such as a family doctor's office or an urgent care centre.
• And increasing home care spending in an effort to keep seniors in their homes and reduce the number of avoidable emergency visits.
“We have emphasized the importance of tackling wait times — not just in emergency departments, but everywhere we can provide care,” said Alberta Health Services' acting CEO Dr. Chris Eagle.
“We've implemented new protocols to provide additional surge capacity when demand on emergency departments and across the health system reaches critical thresholds.”
And although Alberta Health Services has not yet reached its benchmark goals when it comes to overall ER waiting times – four hours from triage to discharge for patients who do not need hospital admission, and eight hours from triage to bed placement for patients who require hospital admission – the latest news is good news for patients and their families.
At a time when federal politicians are fighting it out with attack ads, recriminations and mudslinging, it's nice to see the Stelmach government and its health-care partners listening to public concerns and taking positive action.
Perhaps federal leaders could take a lesson or two from their provincial counterparts and try listening to public concerns and input for a change? Then again, maybe that's too much to ask.
