Quebec’s health minister says a new deal with the province’s medical specialists will allow the government to tackle the massive backlog of surgeries caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
More than 158,000 people are on a waiting list to get surgery in Quebec. Because of pandemic-related delays, more than 17,000 have been waiting for over a year.
“This has been very difficult in the last three years,” Quebec’s health minister Christian Dubé said. “We have been able, thanks to the specialists and the nurses and all the personnel to minimize the impact.”
Dubé says an agreement with the Federation of Medical Specialists of Quebec (FMSQ) will allow the government to bring the number of people dealing with excessive wait times back to pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2024.
Before COVID, 2,500 people had been waiting over a year for surgery. The pandemic caused that number to jump to 22,000. Progress has been made and that number is down to about 17,000. Now the health minister says his plan is to get down to 7,600 by March of next year and back to 2,500 by the end of 2024.
“The virus is still there, but it has less impact on our hospitals and surgeries, so I think it’s quite encouraging,” he said.
The $400 million plan promises to optimize the use of operating rooms, and reopen ones that are closed.
There will be overtime pay for medical professionals who volunteer to perform surgeries during nights, weekends and holidays.
“Our part of the of the deal is to make sure that the doctors are mobilized and that they will be available to to work extra hours, that’s the commitment that we have,” said Dr. Vincent Oliva, the president of the FMSQ.
The $400 in funding is available to tackle the problem thanks to the Institut de la pertinence des actes médicaux, a government institute that has been working with doctors to eliminate useless medical interventions.
Each medical facility has its own wait reduction goals, which the government says it will be watching.
Opposition parties are skeptical of the new plan.
“I don’t believe Christian Dubé,” said interim Liberal leader Marc Tanguay. “It was already promised more than a year ago that we would go from 20,000 people on the waiting list to 3,000 people. We were supposed to be at that level as we speak. But it’s not 3000, it’s at 17,000-plus.”
Dubé said COVID prevented the system from catching up, and he’s confident things will work better this time.
Meanwhile, the province’s biggest nurses union said it wasn’t consulted before Dubé’s announcement.
“We are waiting for Mr. Dubé’s phone call,” said FIQ president Julie Bouchard on her way into the parliamentary commission studying the government’s major health reform proposal, Bill 15.
The involvement of nurses in the surgery wait time reduction strategy will be essential, and Quebec remains in the midst of a critical nursing shortage.
“He’s not addressing the core problem,” said Quebec Solidaire co-spokesperson Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, affirming that Dubé’s new plan will not fix staffing issues.
Opposition parties, however, said they do hope the plan works because patients can’t wait any longer.
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