Get more medical staff: senior

A local seniors' advocate says though the federal and provincial governments' deal to establish a patient wait-time guarantee is a good idea, recruiting health-care staff needs to be the first priority.

Len Fallows, 75, is vice-president of the Saskatchewan Association of Seniors Incorporate and said if the province can't find enough staff to fill the positions needed for the surgeries, then the $24.8 million in federal backing recently announced for the project won't do much good for himself and others waiting for surgery.

Fallows has been on the list for a hip replacement since the fall, and may not be getting into surgery until this fall. He said it's reasonable for seniors and others waiting for surgery to expect a six-month wait for surgery, but anything more than that is too long.

Fallows' call for focus on recruitment is backed by the Saskatchewan Union of Nurses, who says there are upwards of 500 vacancies for registered nurses in the province.

The federal and Saskatchewan health ministers recently said that our province has agreed to establish a patient wait-time guarantee in coronary artery bypass graft surgery by 2010, supported by $24.8 million in federal funding.

Each province was given an area to choose from for the funding: cancer care, hip and knee replacement, cardiac care, diagnostic imaging, cataract surgeries or primary care.

A spokesman said the Prince Albert Parkland Health Region had no comment about the wait-times guarantee agreement.

Doug Dahl said "that's not our procedure," referring to coronary artery bypass graft surgery.

He said such cardiac care treatments are done elsewhere in the province and not in the Prince Albert Parkland Health Region.

He also said there is no way to find numbers of people in the region who receive these treatments.

jkiunga@paherald.sk.ca