The Alberta government is moving forward with spending $39 million to boost urgent care capacity, which right now is primarily centered in the Calgary region.
The province says the money is to go toward land acquisition for nine new urgent care centres across the province, which could divert up to 300,000 emergency room visits per year.
The $39 million in new funding over three years for planning and land acquisition for the nine urgent care centres was announced this past spring in the 2026 provincial budget.
Once operational, the new facilities would more than double Alberta’s urgent care network to 15 centres from six.
There are currently five urgent cares in the Calgary region (Airdrie, Cochrane, Okotoks, the downtown Calgary Sheldon M. Chumir Health Centre and South Calgary Health Centre) and one in central Edmonton that is open weekday evenings and on weekends.
Urgent care centres are smaller than hospitals and designed to treat people with immediate, but non-life-threatening, medical needs that need to be treated that same day, such as broken bones, asthma attacks, cuts and infections and other pains.
The centres are planned for west and south Edmonton, the Stony Plain-Spruce Grove area, east Calgary, Lethbridge, Medicine Hat, Cold Lake, Fort McMurray and Sylvan Lake.
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The province said more detailed site information will be released as land acquisition is finalized and planning completed.
When announcing $17 million in planning funding in March 2025, then-health minister Adriana LaGrange said the locations were chosen based on demand in hospitals and population growth.
At that time, the province said more than 35 per cent of E.R. visits in Alberta ended up being for non-life-threatening conditions that could be treated at an urgent care facility.
The province says on average, an urgent care centre in Alberta provides care to approximately 30,000 to 33,000 patients annually.
— More to come…
With files from The Canadian Press
as long its a male doctor with a big finger i am happy ! prostate exams once a year don’t come fast enough
Vote buying has started.
We do not need these new ideas. We need to follow the NDP and their union owners and go back to their plan of just dumping more tax dollars down the union rabbit hole. Ya, that will fix it……
NOW she starts to pretend she cares about albertans? after three years of prancing in front of mics, and cameras advancing her own ideologies and just a year before the next election?
lying dani, here in alberta we know who you are and i dare say your counterparts around the first ministers’ table do so as well.
Mark @6:16 This is a great announcement, it’s more likely to free up wait times in urban locations. Nobody chooses to go out to a rural location unless they truly believe that their wait time is significantly shorter.
Privatizing right on the planned path.
Sleezebags.
What we need is a Health Minister that knows what they doing!
My question is will they be under Public or Private run with using PUBLIC funds. With rising population in city’s I believe more Public Hospitals are needed, why drive out of cities to probably be shipped back.
More nonsense from Smith and the UCP. When we are hurt, we go to the ER. We do not travel further to go to a hospital that specializes in heart attacks or broken limbs. And those with life threatening injuries will not like being driven past these centers because they would not qualify to receive urgent care.
Lets just call them hospitals.
Our local hospital closes regularly because we have the building and nursing staff, but no doctors. How will this help?
82 million wasted on a referendum that could have gone into healthcare, education or housing, but oh no ! The anti Canadian separatists leader would rather go way way out and beyond to further her seperatists agenda , to sow division and hatred amongst Canadians . Gov smith is not done yet , Canadians must demand her removal from office.
So the people on the left spectrum including most likely the vast majority of doctors and nurses are complaining of overcrowding.So these people along with teachers and most other public workers voted for this!!They voted for the Liberal/NDP coalition for a decade plus,that flooded the country with historical amounts of 3rd world immigrants,vote smarter next time.
Great news, but who will staff them?
This is just for planning.
How much you want to bet that the “planners” who get this job are UCP donators?
I hope this will be enough help! Over -crowded hospitals has been a problem for more than four years. Finally, they say they’re doing something. We can tell there’s an election coming up! Smith wants people to think she’s so wonderful and forget all the other issues she’s caused!
What about northwest/northcentral Edmonton? Nothing in these areas.