About eight late-term pregnant women on Salt Spring Island are being advised to move off the island to have their babies due to a midwife shortage in the Gulf Islands.
A midwife shortage at Lady Minto Hospital on Salt Spring Island has resulted in women who are 37 to 42 weeks into their pregnancies being advised to temporarily relocate to areas such as Victoria, Sidney, Cowichan or the Lower Mainland to be closer to a labour and delivery health-care provider from mid-July to mid-August.
Health-care workforce challenges are having an impact across the country, including the Gulf Islands, said Island Health.
In order to ensure safe perinatal care for birthing parents and newborns, Island Health said, its perinatal team is “temporarily adjusting labour and delivery services on Salt Spring Island to ensure safe perinatal care continues.”
Island Health said the temporary midwife shortage on the Gulf Islands will affect up to eight families, all of whom have been contacted.
Any patients in labour who arrive at Lady Minto Hospital in the next month will be assessed and transferred only if it is deemed medically safe for the patient and baby, said Island Health. Any high-risk pregnancies would typically be transferred to a larger hospital in any case.
”If a transfer is not deemed medically safe, strategies are in place to support delivery at Lady Minto,” said the health authority. “We acknowledge the inconvenience of this temporary change and appreciate people’s patience as we work to support birth services on Salt Spring Island.”
