As wait times rise, NDP must bring back out-of-province surgeries

Opinion

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This article was published 10/05/2024 (485 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Until Manitoba’s health-care system has enough surgical capacity to bring down wait times for hip and knee replacement surgery, the NDP government should give patients the option again of travelling out-of-province for their procedures.

Manitobans continue to wait longer for hip and knee surgery despite an pledge by the NDP during last year’s provincial election to reduce wait times. According to fresh wait-time data released Thursday, the median wait time for knee replacement in Manitoba jumped to 36 weeks in March, up from 32 weeks in February. In 2023, the median wait time for knee surgery was 26 weeks (that doesn’t include the time it takes to see a specialist, which the province does not publish).

The wait time for hip replacement surgery was 26 weeks in March, down slightly from 28 weeks in February, but up from January and well above the median wait time of 21 weeks in 2023.

It’s going in the wrong direction.

Six weeks after winning the Oct. 3 election, the NDP dismantled the Diagnostic and Surgical Recovery Task Force set up by the previous Tory government in December 2021. Scrapping the task force, which was little more than an additional and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy, was the right thing to do.

But the task force also provided some patients with the option of getting certain surgeries (including hip and knee) quicker out of province, paid for by Manitoba Health. It shaved months off the wait times for some and provided relief to many waiting in excruciating pain.

Instead of keeping that option while winding down the task force, the NDP government threw the baby out with the bathwater and cancelled it. It was a major error.

The NDP has never adequately explained why it eliminated that option. It claims that instead of sending patients out-of-province for treatment, it plans to build surgical capacity at home. That’s fine but doing so takes time. Until then, why would government cancel a perfectly reasonable alternative for some patients? It makes no sense.

Even if it cost government more to send patients out of province (and it did), it’s worth it to provide some Manitobans with relief sooner.

Waiting for hip and knee surgery can be an agonizing experience. In many cases, people on the wait list can barely walk. When they can, it can be extremely painful as bone rubs on bone. Sending some patients elsewhere for surgery alleviated that pain and gave many people quality of life. The NDP took that away.

The only explanation for doing so is the Kinew government is ideologically opposed to out-of-province surgeries. Many of the procedures were performed at private clinics, which the NDP doesn’t like. As a result, it’s prepared to put its ideological beliefs ahead of patient care.

It’s unrealistic to expect any new government to reduce health-care wait times after only a few months in office. The province has to hire more nurses and other front-line workers to increase surgical capacity. That takes time, especially amidst a national shortage of health-care professionals.

In the meantime, government should do everything possible to provide people with options to get their surgeries done sooner, including having them performed outside of Manitoba.

There is some good news in the data released this week. Manitoba’s health-care system is performing more hip and knee replacement surgeries than ever before. In 2023, hospitals in Manitoba completed 3,758 knee replacements, up from 2,879 the year before and more than the 2,963 done in 2019, the year before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Hospitals performed 2,411 hip replacements in 2023, an increase from 2,181 the year before and higher than the 2,086 in 2019.

But it’s still not keeping pace with demand under a growing and aging population. Ergo the need to find options to help reduce wait times. Sending patients out of province as a temporary measure is a reasonable solution for some.

The NDP should reverse its decision on this. There is nothing wrong with admitting error in government. In fact, it shows people that government is willing to learn from its mistakes and that it’s focused on getting the best results possible, regardless of ideology.

The Kinew government should acknowledge that in its haste to dismantle the task force, it erred in eliminating out-of-province surgeries. That option should be reinstated to provide at least a small number of Manitobans with quicker access to surgery and to help bring down wait times for those having their procedures done at home.

That would be the right and humane thing to do.

tom.brodbeck@freepress.mb.ca