The NDP published a photo showing a patient in the emergency room of St. Paul’s Hospital who waited for more than 140 hours, which is more than five days.
On Tuesday, Vicki Mowat, the opposition’s public health critic, spoke about overcrowding and wait times at emergency rooms in Saskatoon.
She said the morning situation had reached a “crisis point” and health workers were asking her to comment on it.
The Saskatchewan Nurses Union (SUN) said the system is at its worst.
The SUN reported on social media that there were 41 inpatients without beds at St. use ambulance beds, walking beds and waiting rooms instead.
“They’re concerned that there’s going to be a death, a serious illness, something that happens on their watch that not only would they have to deal with ethically, but it could be at risk in terms of their license,” Mowat said.
“There are very serious concerns about the situation this is putting our health workers in.”
Mowat said there needs to be a nurse task force, which the SUN has been asking for, and that frontline workers need to be heard.
When asked by the CBC if the NDP has calculated the dollar amount that needs to be put into the health care system to fix it, Mowat said the party needs to have those conversations and more will come out as it releases its platform in the coming months.
The Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) said “ongoing work” is being done to address emergency room overcapacity issues.
“Our intention is to always care for patients in an appropriate care environment and exclude the use of walking beds in our emergency departments whenever possible. However, pressures on capacity can ebb and flow which means we must also adapt to meet demand, but provide safe, high-quality care at all times,” the SHA said in an email.
SHA cited its Saskatoon Capacity Pressure Action Plan and how progress is continuing with that initiative.
In November, SHA announced a plan to address overcrowding in Saskatoon hospitals, which included one-, three- and six-month targets.
The statement by the health authorities concludes that the actions taken so far with the capacity plan have a significant effect.
SUN President Tracy Zambory said the capacity plan is not working and that the problem has only gotten worse since this “promise” was made by the SHA.
“They’ve started calling just regular chairs that people sit in the waiting room ‘treatment chairs,’ well they’re not, they’re just regular chairs where someone who was very sick sits, where a nurse is now forced to provide care there ,” Zambory said.
Zambory said he wants front-line workers to be listened to and that SHA is not.
The SHA said its leadership members have been physically present at all of the city’s emergency departments and heard the concerns and are working with health care providers to address the capacity issues.
“When registered nurses tell us that if that’s not the biggest red flag in the alarm bell, I don’t know what it is for people to stand up and take notice and finally realize that we have to do something here instead of putting just out plans that are just full of, you know, broken promises,” Zambory said.
“Not just them [nurses] lost hope, but they have lost complete confidence in the leadership, the SHA and the leadership of this district.”
#Crisis #point #NDP #toughens #province #overcrowded #emergency #rooms #long #hospital #wait #times #CBC #news