A full house at the city's ER had patients and staff expressing concerns over wait times and examination spaces Monday.
Emergency room doctor Daryl Leiski said he strongly recommends patients go to their family doctor or a walk-in clinic for basic health needs instead of turning to the Prince George ER. He was concerned over the level of care he and the emergency team at University Hospital of Northern B.C. could provide, even to those with
serious health needs.
"There are no emergency patient beds in emerge," he said. "It is completely full with admitted patients. ER is functioning as a ward. Emerge nurses' skills are being used instead as ward nurses. Areas where we'd normally see to acutely ill patients are closed because they are full of admitted patients."
He said exams were being done for serious health issues in improvised spaces, in the hallway and in the waiting room itself, which was backed up for hours.
"The hospital is very full overall," said Northern Health spokesman Steve Raper. Raper agreed that ER overcrowding was happening Monday, and it is commonly at or near capacity on other occasions.
Raper said the onset of flu season could make the crowding worse.
Contingency plans exist to bring in extra staff if areas at the hospital become overburdened, Rapier said.
He concurred with Leiski that so-called "sniffles, bumps and bruises" medical issues be taken to a family doctor or walk-in clinic first.
"There is no silver bullet solution to this, no single thing that will fix this problem," said Raper.
"We are not the only jurisdiction dealing with ER overcrowding, it is systemic right now, so we are working in a lot of fields to ease that. There is definitely an issue, so we are boiling down a lot of different parts of the system, especially at the front end - public health, healthy living, preventive measure, and so on - to ease the traffic and keep people from needing ER at all, and that is to the benefit of everyone.
He added, "The work the Prince George Division of Family Practice [a coalition of doctors forwarding a number of new patient-care initiatives] is doing is hopefully going to alleviate some of that."
Long-term plans are of little comfort to the lineups in need on Monday, said Leiski. He said at 9 a.m. there were two who needed attention but by 11 a.m. there were 20 knocking on the ER door, and there was no room back at 9 a.m.
"The space where we normally see minor-issue patients has been unavailable for months. It's been open one day in seven for the past several months," he said. "We are becoming a holding tank for non-emergency patients from other parts of the hospital and now, people coming in to ER have to be aware that there will be extremely long waits except for the most serious cases."
The ER is staffed by two to three doctors at a time, usually, and about six nurses.
