Non-essential surgeries, maternity services return to two hospitals in area
More routine health procedures in Alberta are moving forward after Premier Jason Kenney announced Friday Calgary and Brooks were allowed to continue with reopening starting Monday.
More non-essential surgeries will resume and maternity services will return to two Calgary-area hospitals that had suspended their services in a bid to increase the number of beds available to COVID-19 patients.
According to Alberta Health Minister Tyler Shandro, the moves are possible because Alberta managed to flatten the curve of infections from the novel coronavirus.
“Because our health system is able to cope with COVID-19, we need to set aside fewer beds,” Shandro said. “If cases rise again, our hospitals will still have the capacity to accommodate them, and we can move forward with reopening health care services, including access to regulated, allied health professionals and scheduled services throughout the province.”
Non-urgent in-patient surgeries — those that require an overnight hospital stay — will start to resume next week, with those who have waited longest and who most urgently require surgery given priority for rescheduling.
The services will resume at different times in different parts of the province, depending on how they have managed the COVID -19 pandemic, Shandro said. Examples of non-urgent surgeries that will resume include joint replacements and some heart surgeries.
The announcement follows one made May 4 that saw regular outpatient surgeries in Alberta resume. Since then, about 3,000 scheduled surgeries have been completed, according to Alberta Health.
Alberta suspended all non-urgent and elective surgeries March 18 to ensure the province had enough hospital beds for the peak of the pandemic. Alberta Health Services vice-president Mark Joffe said last week Alberta has been operating around 40 per cent of its usual surgical capacity since then and anticipates returning to 70 to 80 per cent of its regular outpatient surgical volume in the next six weeks. AHS also announced Friday maternity services would be reinstated at Calgary’s South Health Campus and the High River Hospital effective June 3.
The resumption follows an April 16 AHS announcement that maternity services at the two hospitals, including childbirth and in-patient obstetric and neonatal care, would be consolidated to other Calgary hospitals to prepare for a potential spike in COVID -19 cases.
The return of maternity services to the hospitals hinges on the Calgary zone maintaining a manageable number of COVID -19 cases in upcoming weeks, AHS said.
As of Friday, 54 Albertans are in hospital with COVID-19, six of whom are in intensive care units. A total of 134 Albertans have died from the virus after two new deaths were reported Friday.
Additionally, Shandro announced Friday that Alberta would further expand COVID -19 testing.
Starting Monday, residents and staff at Alberta long-term care facilities will be able to sign up for voluntary testing, even if they are not showing any COVID -19 symptoms. The tests are meant to help detect asymptomatic COVID-19 cases early and protect residents at the facilities, where 98 Albertans have died of the coronavirus.
As well, also starting Monday, residents of the Calgary zone living within 50 kilometres of a COVID -19 testing site who require a test will be able to book their own testing appointment through the province’s online COVID-19 self-assessment tool.
Despite being allowed to continue with reopening, the Calgary area continues to be home to the majority of Alberta’s active COVID -19 cases — 639 of the province’s 865 ongoing cases are in the city and nearby communities.
To date, Alberta has detected 6,800 COVID-19 cases after 32 new cases were reported Friday, and 5,710 Albertans have recovered from the virus.