Initiative showing results

Almost four years after launching the Saskatchewan Surgical Initiative surgical wait times are on the decline.

The latest provincial wait times numbers show that, as of Aug. 31, 80 per cent of patients received their surgery within three months of their referral from a surgeon and 91 per cent received it within six months.

“Saskatchewan is changing the definition of a long wait for surgery,” Health Minister Dustin Duncan said in a news release. “After March 2014, any wait longer than three months will be too long.”

The number of people waiting more than three months for surgery has dropped 59 per cent from 15,345 in March 2010 to 6,264 at the end of August 2013.

The Regina Qu’Appelle Health Region (RQHR) has had 11 straight months of improved wait times, showing a 32-per-cent drop in the number of people waiting more than three months — from 5,692 on Sept. 1, 2012 to 3,859 on Aug. 31.

However, in Saskatoon Health Region, the number of patients waiting more than three months on Aug. 31 increased from the previous month by 188 to 2,082. The health region has seen demand for surgery grow by about 700 cases more than estimated this year, and is working with its surgeons and the Ministry of Health to find ways to meet the demand.

According to the Fraser Institute’s, Waiting your turn: Wait times for health care in Canada, 2013 Report, there is still room for improvement.

The 23rd annual waiting list survey revealed that wait times for surgical and other therapeutic treatments increased in 2013.

However, the survey uses the wait time between referral from a general practitioner to the delivery of elective treatment by a specialist as a marker.

According to those numbers when averaged across all 12 specialties and 10 provinces surveyed, it showed an increase in wait times from 17.7 weeks last year to 18.2 weeks in 2013.

However, compared to 1993, the total waiting time in 2013 is 95-per-cent longer.

There were waiting time increases in six provinces, but Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland/Labrador all showed a decrease.

That national average is 18.2 per cent.

In Western Canada, the wait times improved the further west one went. Manitoba averaged 25.9 weeks followed closely by Saskatchewan with 25.7 weeks. In Alberta the average was 23.1 weeks and in B.C. the wait time fell to under 20 weeks at 19.9.

According to the survey, in all 10 provinces people are waiting for an estimated 928,120 procedures, which means 2.7 per cent of Canadians are waiting for treatment.

Physicians report that only about 11.1 per cent of their patients are on a waiting list because they requested a delay or postponement.

The results of this year’s survey indicate that despite provincial wait times reduction strategies and high levels of health expenditure, it is clear that patients in Canada continue to wait too long to receive medically necessary treatment.

The full report is available online at www.fraserinstitute.org.