An emergency room doctor at Nanaimo General Hospital says the situation in Vancouver Island’s busiest ER is unsafe.
Veteran ER doctor Chris Rumball told Postmedia News that a shortage of hospital general-practice doctors — called hospitalists — is leading to unsafe conditions in the ER, with some patients left for up to 24 hours without attention unless they are in an emergency condition.
“It’s chaotic, patients are being held there with no one looking after them,” Rumball said.
When a sick person arrives in Nanaimo’s emergency room, they are triaged and treated immediately if their condition is life threatening. However, if their condition isn’t critical but they still need to be kept in hospital, they must wait up to 24 hours to be seen by a hospitalist due to the staff shortage, Rumball said.
Rumball, who has been in practice for 47 years and has a master’s degree in health systems management, made his comments after doctors, surgeons and specialists at Nanaimo General Hospital sent a letter to Health Minister Adrian Dix and the head of Island Health, Kathy McNeil, warning of a crisis at the hospital.
“The medical staff at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital has a professional obligation to draw your attention to the deterioration in the provision of patient care at NRGH due to the existential crisis threatening the collapse of our hospitalist service,” the letter read.
According to Rumball, the number of hospitalists working at Nanaimo General Hospital has fallen by a third over the past year.
“Historically, the surgical and medical specialty services at NRGH relied on the hospitalist team to share and often assume care of in-patients. In the absence of a robust hospitalist team, this shared management model has collapsed, resulting in significant delays in patient care, and increased risk of morbidity and mortality,” the letter read.
Marko Peljhan, Island Health’s vice-president of clinical service responsible for Nanaimo General Hospital, confirmed that the number of hospitalists at the hospital was down by eight from the optimum number of 24.
“They are the physicians that provide much of our in-patient care once you are admitted to the hospital. So over the past couple of months, they have been managing a reduced number of physicians on staff and with that it has caused delays (for patients) to be seen and that is what the letter is pertaining to,” Peljhan said.
“It’s definitely not an ideal situation.”
However, Peljhan said that anyone requiring emergency care should still go to the hospital for treatment.
Peljhan said Island Health was working with hospitalists to come up with an agreement that would improve working conditions and salary to attract more hospitalists.
Rumball said these negotiations have been underway for three years, adding the health authority was aware for several years that the number of hospitalists would fall.
In June, Health Minister Adrian Dix announced a new contract would be created with hospitalists to improve retention as part of an overall effort to improve conditions at Surrey Memorial Hospital.
