SHA releases plan to ease capacity woes at Regina hospitals

The Saskatchewan Health Authority has released a plan to address capacity issues in Regina hospitals, one month after a similar plan for Saskatoon was announced.

On Thursday, the SHA issued the Regina Capacity Pressure Action Plan — one feature of which is the addition of more beds at the hospitals.

The release of the plan comes one day after the Saskatchewan NDP showed reporters a leaked memo suggesting that overcrowding in the city’s hospitals had come to the attention of the fire marshal.

“We acknowledge hospital capacity pressures are impactful not only for our patients seeking care, but for our staff, physicians and ambulance providers who are providing excellent care,” Derek Miller, the SHA’s chief operating officer, said in a media release.

“Taking targeted action in Regina to address capacity pressures will benefit Regina residents and support patient flow from our regional centres. The SHA is working to address unique capacity pressures in our urban hospitals, which will provide a direct benefit to capacity pressures across the province.”

The SHA noted the rise in seasonal respiratory viruses and in patients “presenting with increasingly complex needs” has increased demands at the hospitals.

“We understand from past experience, this will continue through the holiday season, so the actions already completed and those underway are meant to both address challenges now as well as the anticipated surge in demand in the weeks ahead,” Sheila Anderson, the SHA’s vice-president of Integrated Regina Health, said in the release.

“Our goal is to better support our dedicated staff and partners in Regina and across the province.”

The plan — which was designed by the SHA in collaboration with the Ministry of Health — noted actions that already had been taken to increase hospital capacity in the city. Those included adding 28 beds at the Pasqua, hiring additional emergency room staff, and the opening of six high-acuity beds at the General and six hospice beds at the Wascana Rehabilitation Centre.

Over the next 90 days, the plan calls for the establishment of new initiatives. Those include adding staff within acute care to speed up discharges to free up inpatient beds, adding 20 transitional beds to speed up patient discharge and moving patients from hospitals to appropriate care settings, adding palliative home care resources to reduce people going to ERs, adding four more high-acuity beds at the General, and increasing adherence to existing overcapacity protocols to move patients out of ERs to other places.

The SHA also has longer-term plans that are to take effect over the next three to nine months. Those include opening the Regina Urgent Care Centre to serve as an alternative to ERs, opening new addictions beds in the spring, adding long-term care beds in the Regina area, and moving ahead with the procurement for 240 specialized long-term care beds.

The plan didn’t say where the staff would come from, but the SHA said it and the provincial government also are continuing their work to add health-care workers through the Health Human Resources Action Plan.

“The SHA commits to continued engagement with staff to hear their ideas, understand their needs and ensure we are working collaboratively to provide the best possible care to our patients not only in Regina and Saskatoon, but across the province,” the media release said.

“SHA executive and senior leadership will continue to visit care areas to ensure we can remove barriers and challenges as they occur and adapt activities to ensure needs are well known and responded to.”

Saskatchewan’s nurses have raised concerns about that issue, saying those conversations haven’t been happening.