After refusing to take a stand and say that the Emergency Room closures are temporary at the meeting on Sunday, September 7, Northern Health has released a statement saying it “will consider service changes to be temporary as it continues community meetings in Tumbler Ridge.”
The Health Authority is meeting with community groups in a series of roundtables to continue to work through the overnight and weekend on-call changes taking place in the community.
“Recognizing the changes provide a different response for after-hours emergency care, and hearing concerns expressed by the community during a Town Hall Meeting on Sunday, Northern Health is going to continue to meet with groups in the community to work through the current changes, listen to challenges, and explore any opportunities to make further adjustments,” they posted on Facebook yesterday.
“Northern Health will continue engaging the community about the temporary changes and how they can bring greater reliability to after-hours care for the community through increased BC Ambulance coverage, quicker response time for emergency care needs, and to better position the Health Centre to recruit and retain clinicians during a period of global health care workforce instability,” they continued.
They say they are committed to listening and exploring concerns. They say they are down to 50 percent coverage in the clinic itself, so the service changes “are necessary and have been implemented at this time.” But they say they want to “ensure the community has accurate and up to date information, and work with the community where there are opportunities to make further improvements to support the health services in Tumbler Ridge.”
As of now, overnight on-call in Tumbler Ridge has been replaced by 911 direct BC Ambulance response to emergency calls that happen between 7 pm and 8 am.
“Tumbler Ridge averages less than five after hour calls a week and the majority don’t require emergency hospital care,” says the post. “The call out provision means there is a delay in care that can be mitigated for emergency cases by having an ambulance respond directly. This model will also support the recruitment and retention of staff to provide care during the day without the added burden of overnight call coverage and the negative impact on next-day primary community care and emergency room services.”
Mayor and council continue to work on restoring coverage in the clinic.
Above image: Lisa Zetes-Zanatta, Vice President, Clinical Operations addresses the crowd at the Community Centre on September 7
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.
