REGINA — The Saskatchewan Health Authority and Ministry of Health have announced that goals to address the pandemic-caused surgical backlog in the province will include significant increases to surgical capacities over the next four years.
Health Minister Paul Merriman shared details of the province’s plan on Dec. 9, describing the targets set as “aggressive.”
“We’re comfortable that we can achieve these targets and be able to get the backlog [addressed],” said Merriman.
Following the significant slowdown of services this fall as a response to growing COVID-19 pressures on the system, Merriman estimated that approximately 35,000 people are now on the province’s surgical waitlist, with possibly more waiting unbooked in the wings.
“We do expect that [number] to increase now that people are able to come in and book their appointments, get assessed,” said Merriman.
To alleviate the backlog, Merriman said the health authority has set a target of performing an additional 7,000 surgeries in 2022, 6,000 in 2023 and 5,000 in 2024 over pre-pandemic surgical volumes.
Merriman said this increase will be achieved through several changes, like optimizing operating room hours and increasing use of regional surgical sites.
The province is also looking to outsource some procedures to private contractors through private contracts with the health authority, including day surgeries, overnight inpatient procedures, and post-operative care.
Merriman said increasing third-party services would free up SHA resources for more complex procedures.
“These numbers were determined by what we thought we could do within the public sector within the SHA, and what we can also do by publicly funding the private sector,” said Merriman.
A focus will be placed on completing procedures with the longest-waiting patients, said the SHA, including those waiting for hip and knee replacements, ear, nose and throat and other general surgeries.
Merriman said the province remains committed to prior promises to reduce surgical wait times to three months by 2030.
The four-year targeted increase is currently considered a temporary plan, said Merriman, but it is possible the health authority may consider maintaining these annual surgical volumes past 2024.
“The main priority right now is to try to get everybody that we possibly can to have their surgeries done in a timely and safe manner,” said Merriman.
Merriman was unable to provide a potential cost to the proposed volume increases and outsourcing to third-party contracts, but said those numbers are part of ongoing budget talks.
Plans are also in place to increase ICU capacity in the province to 90 permanent beds from the current 79 allocated during non-pandemic operations, by June of 2022.
An additional 10 high-acuity beds are also set to be added in Regina by this coming spring, to assist with transitioning patients between levels of care.
The SHA and Ministry of Health are working together to finalize a long-term plan to address the province’s needs for critical care services, said Merriman.
“This is a large hill for us to climb, but I’m very confident we can do it with the addition of publicly funded private clinics,” said Merriman.
More staff will be needed for success, said Merriman
Recruitment of additional personnel including nurses and other health care professionals will be key to complete both targeted expansions, admitted Merriman.
He said the health authority will be looking internally to its current pool of employees to fill positions, by potentially upgrading casual and part-time nurses to full-time.
“We’re working with our labour partners to see if that’s possible,” said Merriman.
Active recruiting will also be taking place, approaching both nursing graduates fresh from post-secondary studies as well as international recruitment.
Increasing the number of available seats in post-secondary critical care training programs in the province will also be part of the plan, including bumping seats at Saskatchewan Polytechnic up to 144 in the next year.
A recent survey by University of Regina professor Sean Tucker of 3,000 health care staff in the province showed that more and more frontline workers are reporting declining mental health and a desire to reduce work hours due to pandemic-related stress and burnout.
When asked if he thinks this reality may pose a concern for recruitment plans, Merriman said that he knows health care workers have “been under a tremendous amount of pressure.”
“We understand that people are stressed out and it’s been a very, very long haul for them,” said Merriman.
He said that the health authority is aware of employee burnout and will respect the needs of staff, which is why a pushed increase of post-secondary recruitment has been included in the plan.
Merriman said both the SHA and ministry are “confident” they can meet recruitment challenges.
Since the SHA began it's service resumption in November, an estimated 90 per cent of redeployed staff have now returned to their regular positions within the healthcare system.
