Achi news desk-
Doctors in Edmonton are warning that babies could die because of the city’s overcrowded neonatal intensive care units.
Doctors with the Edmonton Area Medical Staff Association have sent a letter to Health Minister Adrianna LaGrange and Athana Mentzelopoulos, president and CEO of Alberta Health Services, pleading for help with what they say is a dire situation.
A doctor says neonatal intensive care units at Edmonton hospitals have reached a tipping point.
“We’re starting to get to the point where there’s potential serious harm that’s going to hurt the most vulnerable, vulnerable patients we have in this state,” said Dr Mona Gill, co-author of the letter. and is president of the Edmonton Zone Medical Staff Association.
“We would like to address the problem before we make headlines for dead babies in the province.”
Gill is a new mother herself and that prompted her to write the letter.
“I can’t even stomach the fact that my baby could potentially be transferred to another state at such a critical time to provide care, because of this government’s lack of foresight to address capacity issues that they know which has existed for years now,” she said.
The doctors say that there has been a shortage of beds for years and that is now having results.
EZMSA said 30 percent of this year, Edmonton’s NICUs have been operating at 95 to 102 percent capacity.
“The nurses are looking after too many babies at one time and this means that frail, underweight babies are not even able to eat promptly,” the letter said.
He also noted that the environment is not conducive to families, saying that the semi-private design of most NICUs does not allow parents to stay with their babies.
For example, the association said only two of the 69 beds in the Royal Alexandra Hospital NICU are single patient rooms. There are nine parental care rooms, but the majority of these are semi-private.
“One can imagine how difficult it would be for parents to be forced to be away from their baby during this uncertain time,” the letter reads.
The Edmonton Region Medical Staff Association said in 2022 and again in 2023, briefing notes were presented to Alberta Health sounding the alarm for urgently needed beds, staffing, transport teams, and pediatrics / neonatology teams.
The latest health and medical news is emailed to you every Sunday.
“These have been largely ignored,” the organization said.
EZMSA said that the intention to add six new beds in the zone has resulted in a net zero of new beds. He gave an example of how the NICU at Sturgeon Hospital in St. Albert six beds open to address critical need – but because ongoing funding could not be secured, beds were closed at other sites where they were already facing capacity issues of their own. .
Alberta’s population continues to grow and Edmonton doctors fear there will be serious consequences for not keeping up with the demand for places.
“These babies have nowhere else to be cared for and we believe the situation has become so critical that infant deaths may soon follow.”
“We ask that meaningful attention be given to the province’s smallest patients,” the letter concluded.
The health minister said Alberta babies may have to be taken out of the province for health care.
“If we need to transport those babies or their families to other cities or other states, I’m willing to do whatever it takes to make sure our babies are well taken care of,” LaGrange said.
The leader of the opposition NDP, Rachel Notley, criticized the suggestion as a failure of the government.
“We are moving our most vulnerable little patients to other parts of the country. That tells me the UCP is failing, fundamentally, in the most important job they have,” said Notley.
Notley called on the government to reverse the decision to cancel the proposed hospital in south Edmonton that would have added new NICU beds, as well as a new Stolery, “just to bring us to the minimum capacity we need on for a young and expanding population. .”
“Danielle Smith needs to understand this situation as the crisis.”
The doctors agreed that instead of moving patients – there was a dire need for more beds, more staff and more funding.
“Not even the emotional factor, the sheer cost of trying to transport a baby across state lines is astronomical,” Gill said of the specialized transportation systems needed to move sick children.
“It’s in the tens of thousands of dollars just to transport that baby.”
There are currently 133 NICU beds in the Edmonton Zone and 126 NICU beds in the Calgary Zone. In addition, there are 17 NICU beds in Red Deer, 10 NICU beds in Grande Prairie, 16 in Lethbridge, and seven in Medicine Hat, Alberta Health Services said in a statement.
AHS acknowledged that there was “significant patient demand” but that there was capacity in the province.
“Occupancy varies between 90 and a little above 100 percent, but again, we have capacity,” AHS spokeswoman Kerry Williamson said in a statement Tuesday afternoon. “As of midday today, nine NICU beds were available in the Edmonton Zone, 14 in the Calgary Zone, seven in Red Deer, seven in the South Zone, and three in Grande Prairie.”
He added that during periods of high numbers, teams across the province work together to ensure that children get the care they need – transferring them if necessary.
In its letter, the staff association also claimed that the pay and working conditions offered for clinical assistants are not competitive compared to other states, work restrictions have been placed on these providers without consultation, and there has been a failure the mechanisms to attract and recruit.
He said the lack of funding for nurse practitioners was also a cause for concern.
The health minister has asked her team for a full review to see what the situation is and how to fix it. There is no timetable for when that will be completed.
& copy 2024 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
