Slight improvements in city ER wait times cause for cautious optimism

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This article was published 05/04/2024 (618 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If Manitobans are looking for any sign health care is improving under the NDP government, they may want to check out emergency room wait times in Winnipeg.

They have improved, a little, over the past two months. Recently released data from the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority shows wait times in February fell for the second consecutive month.

It’s hardly a trend. Wait times have fallen for consecutive months before only to soar to new highs, especially over the past three years. ER wait times hit an all-time high in December after a six-month surge that included record wait times at several Winnipeg hospitals.

St. Boniface Hospital has been particularly hard hit. The wait time at Manitoba’s second-largest hospital reached a median wait time of 5.9 hours in December and a staggering 90th-percentile wait of 16 hours in January (the longest wait time for nine out of 10 patients). Both were record highs for the facility.

The good news is there’s been some relief since then.

Over the past two months, median ER wait times have dropped slightly across Winnipeg, to 3.58 hours. That’s down from 3.67 hours in January and a record four hours in December.

That could be nothing more than the usual ups and downs of emergency-room demands. But the fact it occurred mid-winter, when respiratory diseases such as influenza and COVID-19 typically peak and fill ERs with very sick patients, is an encouraging sign.

Wait times in all three Winnipeg ERs have declined since December. Grace Hospital has seen the biggest drop. Its median wait time fell from 5.47 hours in December to 4.03 hours in February.

St. Boniface Hospital saw its median wait time drop to 4.82 hours during that period. Health Sciences Centre, the province’s largest hospital, also saw a slight decline in ER wait times.

Overall, the 90th percentile wait time across the city fell to 9.93 hours from 10.97 hours in December. It’s still brutally long, but it’s a start — maybe.

The numbers are still far higher than they were a year earlier. The median wait time in February 2023 was 2.77 hours and the 90th percentile 7.17 hours. The NDP has a long way to go to reduce times to tolerable levels. But there are early signs of potential progress.

So what has changed to bring down the numbers? Not much. The NDP implemented a weekend hospital discharge protocol last year that was supposed to help free up medical beds. That probably helped.

The main reason ERs are congested is because too many patients sick enough to be admitted to hospital can’t get a bed on a medical ward. The more hospitals can do to improve patient flow (such as weekend discharges) to free up beds, the fewer admitted patients will languish in ER hallways.

The NDP also announced more staffed medical beds at Grace Hospital. However, it’s unclear whether they have materialized. It’s one thing to announce funding for more nurses and other front-line staff, it’s another to find those workers amid a national shortage of health-care professionals.

The drop in ER wait times may be nothing more than good luck, including an early easing of respiratory illnesses. We won’t know for a few more months whether this is a longer-term trend or just a blip on the radar.

Even if it does continue into the summer months (when ER wait times typically trend downwards), the real test will be next winter.

Will the massive increase in health-care spending ($1 billion more in the NDP’s first budget unveiled this week) make a difference? Will the province come close to hiring 1,000 more front-line staff as promised in the budget? That will be a tall order.

If it does manage to increase the workforce by a net 1,000 workers (or even close to that), will it trickle down to medical wards and add much-needed capacity to hospitals? Those are questions no one will be able to answer for at least another year.

In the meantime, the NDP can take some comfort in knowing that during a period when ER wait times typically rise, or at least remain stable, they have fallen somewhat. NDP politicians probably don’t want to bring attention to that themselves, knowing full well wait times could easily rise again. It’s a bit early to declare victory.

Still, when it comes to health care, anything that’s headed in the right direction is cause for celebration, even if it’s a minor one.

tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca