Retired caregiver asks: how long must I suffer?

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This article was published 26/02/2022 (1469 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For more than 40 years, neonatal transport nurse Sue Roberts went to great lengths to make sure her tiny patients’ health-care needs were met.

Now, the retiree waits for surgery herself — wondering if the system she dedicated her working life to will be able to help her as Manitoba’s backlog of postponed procedures piles up.

“I don’t want to deteriorate to the point where I can’t manage at home,” said Roberts, 73, who is waiting for spinal stenosis surgery and to see the province’s plan for tackling the estimated 52,327 delayed surgeries.

“I’m just going to be a further burden on the system if I have to go to a personal care home or something,” she said from her Winnipeg condo.

Doctors Manitoba’s latest estimate of the overall backlog — including surgeries, diagnostic imaging tests (such as MRIs, ultrasound scans) and other diagnostic procedures (such as allergy tests and endoscopies) — is 161,585 procedures, an increase of 7,748 from its January estimate.

Roberts, who retired in 2016 before her first spinal stenosis surgery, was nurse co-ordinator in the province’s neonatal transport program. Her work involved flying to remote northern communities, caring for newborn babies and helping to move heavy incubators in and out of aircraft and boats.

“My job was mentally and physically demanding,” she said.

Now, Roberts uses a walker, relies on wheelchair transit and is in need of another surgery to stop the fingers on one hand from further bending like claws.

“Right now, I am fairly handicapped but I manage OK at home with a little help from home care,” said Roberts.

In August 2021, her surgeon couldn’t give Roberts a surgery date but told her to go to an emergency room if her condition rapidly deteriorates. Roberts said she won’t do that unless she sees a dramatic change to her health.

“It is frustrating,” Roberts said. “I just don’t want to get to the point where I deteriorate further, if that can be prevented.”

She’s concerned the provincial government has no plan to tackle the massive surgical backlog.

“I just don’t see any action on their part,” Roberts said. “I mean, not concrete action, like ‘this is the plan,’ you know? To some extent, I feel it’s pacifying people.”

On Dec. 8, Health Minister Audrey Gordon announced a task force to address the backlog, with a report expected in the new year setting out an analysis of the current situation, a summary of progress made to date, and how success will be measured.

When Manitoba announced in January a deal with a Sanford Health facility in Fargo, N.D., to perform the type of spine surgery Roberts needs, she said she felt hope.

It was soon dashed, she added, when the clinic said it didn’t have a signed contract with Manitoba and local patients were its first priority.

At a news conference Thursday, Gordon said Manitoba does have a deal with the Fargo surgical centre and the details are being worked out. Gordon said the task force would give an update “very soon.”

The health minister also noted an estimated 500 Manitoba health-care staff redeployed to handle a surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations will return to their home units as pandemic case counts decline, allowing the resumption several services.

Having staff return to their regular roles is encouraging but not enough, Doctors Manitoba said Friday.

“Addressing the backlog will require additional capacity, beyond what existed before the pandemic, and doctors remain ready to help,” a statement said.

NDP health critic Uzoma Asagwara said Manitobans should’ve seen a detailed plan to address the backlog months ago.

“The fact that we still don’t have a plan, a road map and a timeline to deal with this surgical and diagnostic backlog is an absolute failure of this government,” said the nurse turned MLA.

“It is inexcusable that, at this point, Manitoba families who’ve been waiting years for important surgeries, who’ve been waiting in pain, have been suffering without the procedures they need, still don’t have an end date in sight to that,” said Asagwara.

“That’s a failure of this government. There’s no reason for it and the fact that we don’t have a plan yet just speaks to the level of incompetence that’s been on display by this government since before the pandemic.”

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca