The Ontario government has announced $741 million to help clear the backlog of surgeries at Ontario hospitals. Sudbury's Health Sciences North announced earlier this month it has a backlog of roughly 4,200 surgeries to get through. This is because hundreds of elective and non-urgent medical procedures were cancelled back in March when the COVID-19 pandemic was declared.
The funding announcement made Friday by Premier Doug Ford and health minister Christine Elliott is part of Ontario's fall preparedness plan -- Keeping Ontarians Safe: Preparing for Future Waves of COVID-19, said a government news release. Along with helping to clear the backlog of surgeries at hospitals throughout Ontario, the money is intended to build capacity in the health care system and to help manage any surges and outbreaks of COVID-19 cases.
"The last thing patients and families should have to worry about right now is the cancellation of their surgery or procedure due to the second wave of COVID-19," said Premier Ford.
"We are moving mountains to make sure all patients get the top-notch care they deserve, while clearing the backlog of surgeries. At the same time, we are preparing for any future surge or outbreak in order to keep everyone safe and healthy."
Health minister Elliott said the investment is also aimed at reducing the burden on Ontario's health system.
"Expanding access to care to help reduce health service backlogs is part of our plan to ensure that we are ready for future waves of COVID-19," said Minister Elliott. "This investment is essential to help more patients waiting for surgeries and other procedures get the care they need faster and help reduce the burden on our system. To ensure that the health system is prepared to respond to any surges of COVID-19 without interrupting routine health services, we are also increasing capacity in home and community care and expanding digital and virtual health care services," said Elliott.
The health ministry news release also stated Ontario is making the necessary investments to expand access to services and surgical and procedural backlogs by:
-Investing up to $283.7 million to support additional priority surgeries including cancer, cardiac, cataract, and orthopaedic procedures;
-Extending diagnostic imaging hours at health care facilities for MRIs, CT scans, and other critical procedures;
-Adding an additional 139 critical care beds and 1,349 additional hospital beds in hospitals and alternate health facilities across the province to support more surgical procedures; and
-Working to initiate a centralized waitlist and a program to optimize the use of the operating rooms to improve the use of existing resources and increase the number of surgical procedures in hospitals by hundreds on average per year, and improve patient flow by leveraging available surgical capacity in each region.
