Posted on 04/04/2005 11:10:58 AM PDT by fanfan
MDs publish list of acceptable wait times
Physicians launch first salvo to push governments into acting
By ANDRÉ PICARD
Monday, April 4, 2005 Page A8
PUBLIC HEALTH REPORTER
Canada's doctors have launched the first salvo in what promises to be one of the most heated debates in health care in the coming years -- determining acceptable wait times for medical care.
The Wait Time Alliance of Canada has compiled a list of "medically acceptable" wait times in five key areas, including:
Joint replacement: Routine hip and knee replacements should be done within nine months, with patients waiting no more than three months for a consultation and six months for surgery;
Sight restoration: Routine cataract surgery should be done within four months for all patients;
Cancer care: Radiation therapy should begin within 10 working days;
Cardiac care: Non-urgent bypass surgery should be done in less than six months;
Diagnostic imaging: CT scans, MRIs and other nuclear medicine tests should be done within seven days for all patients.
While Ottawa and the provinces promised, as part of the September, 2004, health accord, to establish benchmarks by the end of this year, Ruth Collins-Nakai, president-elect of the Canadian Medical Association, said the alliance was taking the lead on the issue to ensure that wait times are dealt with promptly.
"We are acting now for the good of our patients," she said.
Dr. Collins-Nakai said there is no doubt that many patients are waiting too long for diagnostic and medical procedures, although there is no good national data. (Under the health accord, wait-time data in these five key areas should be published by September.)
There are enough regional anecdotal tales of horror, however, to create widespread concern, and that has vaulted wait times to the top of the list of Canadians' health-care worries.
Arlene Silver of Toronto has just learned of the date for her cataract surgery after a 13-month wait. Then she will go on the list again for the other eye, meaning the wait for the procedures will total close to three years.
Because of her deteriorating eyesight, she has lost the ability to drive and is having trouble reading, making it difficult to do her job as a bookkeeper and compromising the independence she cherishes.
"It's really unfair," Ms. Silver said. "You pay into the system for 50 years and when you finally need it, you want to be able to use it in a reasonable amount of time."
Ms. Silver said she would love to see the new benchmarks -- for cataracts a maximum four-month wait -- adopted and enforced. "You don't mind waiting four months, that would mean both eyes within eight months, instead of waiting almost three years, which really begins to annoy you," she said.
Normand Laberge, chief executive officer of the Canadian Association of Radiologists, another coalition member, said dealing with wait times is not just an issue of money, or personnel, it will also require some changes in how the health system is run.
He also predicted that adopting benchmarks for wait times would have a dramatic impact on patient care because governments that fail to meet the targets "could face legal consequences."
In the $41-billion health accord, $5.5-billion was allocated to reducing wait times in the five priority areas.
Alain Jodoin, president of the Canadian Orthopaedic Association, said while he is also confident that setting benchmarks will make a big difference, the public has to realize the changes will take time.
In the area of hip and knee replacements, where the alliance says the wait should not exceed nine months, "I would say about zero per cent of the population is meeting that benchmark right now," Dr. Jodoin said.
That isn't going to change overnight. "I think what you will see is in one year it's 30 per cent, two years, 60 per cent, and so on."
Wait 'till they get the bill for providing that standard of care of the taxpayer's dime.
You're welcome.
(steely)
Is it common to wait longer than that? That would be an atrocious human-rights violation.
Sounds like a fine place for all those liberals to move - oops, they decided to stay here, didn't they? Too bad, they really should all be forced to appreciate socialized medicine at its finest.
Darn I wish those folks who threatened to leave the US, would!
Did you all know we give free needles to addicts in most major cities, but make diabetics pay for there own needles and insulin?
FREE health care? /rant off (for a sec. ;-)
And ping
Wrong scandal.
Welcome to the great white waste of time. :-(
Maybe they can force more people to be orthopedic surgeons...
Yeah. At gun point.
Ping!
These are desired objectives, and not anywhere near current practice.
I was wondering what they meant by that, "within" what? diagnosis,surgery, first consult..etc
I was wondering what they meant by that, "within" what? diagnosis,surgery, first consult..etc
Probably diagnosis.
Unfortunately, the word 'should' is the operative word here. The rest of the sentence is moot.
OK economists. When the cost to the consumer is zero, what happens to demand?
Right. For the answer to that, just count the number of spam e-mails you get in a week. Or an hour.
(steely)
It's great having facts to hit them with too. :-)
When I visited Prince Edward Island last year, I saw on the news a superb example of the utter failure of socialized medicine. I was watching the local P.E.I. news station (for those of you in Rio Linda, P.E.I. is Canada's smallest province), and the anchorwoman reported that the entire county of Queens (the most heavily populated of PEI's 3 counties) only had TWO ambulances!!!!!!!! Well, some 60-yr-old man had a heart attack @ his home in Queens County, but the only 2 ambulances in the entire county were being used @ that time, so they had to pick him up in a FIRE ENGINE. We all know that fire engines contain SOME medical equipment, but not nearly the equivalent of an ambulance. Guess what? Without the full-blown coronary-care equipment that you'd find in an ambulance, this poor SOB died on the way to the hospital. Hooray for liberalism's answer to health care.
And this was reported on a Canadian news station, not on some "conservative" blog site.
The best health care system in the world from my experience is probably Switzerland with its neighbours having similar systems. The system there is similar to the US model but with state sponsored "catastrophic care" insurance. You'll never miss a chemotherapy treatment in Switzerland if you can't afford to pay, but they also have some of the best private hospitals in the world if you want, say a new hip.
The system in Canada is Marxist. One tier care. Instead of having first rate care for those who can afford it and third rate care (but care nonetheless) for the poor, you have second rate care for everyone. Only Cuba and North Korea follow this system
Note: This system is the "third rail" of Canadian Politics. Its blatant envy politics but most Canadians are "salt of the earth" folks and nothing gets those folks pissed off like someone achieving better than the others in the village.
Driving an Escalade in small town Canada is a huge social faux pas in Canada, even if the neighbours know you have the money.
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