A new surgical centre opening soon in View Royal will help reduce wait times and improve care, Island Health says.
But some worry the farming out of medical procedures to a private facility represents a decay in public health care.
Construction is almost complete on the View Royal Surgical Centre, which is to open near Victoria General Hospital by early May.
Under a contract with Island Health, it will perform 2,500 to 2,750 surgeries annually for patients who can be discharged the same day and don’t need a bed. Procedures will include carpal-tunnel surgery, hernia repairs, gallbladder removals, arthroscopies, knee ligament repairs, rotator cuff repairs and varicose vein surgery.
It will also perform 2,500 to 3,000 screening colonoscopies annually.
Norm Peters, executive director of surgical services for Island Health, said the new centre is part of a larger strategy to reduce surgical wait times.
“We’ll be able to move day care cases from our main hospitals, Victoria General Hospital and Royal Jubilee Hospital, to the surgical clinic — which will allow us to use that freed-up operating room space to do more complex cases,” he said.
Complex cases, such as hip- and knee-replacement surgery, require recovery beds.
A report from the Canadian Institute for Health Information found that in 2016 only 45 per cent of Island Health patients got hip-replacement surgery and 29 per cent got knee-replacement surgery within the recommended 26-week period.
“[Total joint replacement surgery] is where we know we have our longest waits and we need to improve access in those areas,” Peters said.
Following a public tender process in 2015, Island Health signed a contract with Calgary-based Surgical Centres Inc. to build and operate the facility. The company has six clinics in Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C., including Seafield Surgical Centre in Nanaimo.
The contract is for $6 million annually for five years, with an option to renew for another five years. It entitles Island Health to two operating rooms in the building.
While the facility is private, surgeries will be publicly funded and the patients will be drawn from a centralized Island Health wait-list, Peters said. The partnership means Island Health doesn’t have to invest in new infrastructure. “And when we assessed the cost per procedure, their costs come in less than what we’re paying right now.”
That’s because the company has a different financial and labour model, with a different mix of nurses and support staff not governed by a labour agreement, he said.
He noted that private surgical services are heavily legislated and the nurses are fully trained and qualified for surgical care.
Peters said the surgery centre is just one way Island Health is working toward the goal of treating 95 per cent of hip- and knee-replacement patients within 26 weeks over the next year.
NDP health critic Judy Darcy said there’s no evidence this will reduce wait times, which have risen significantly over the past four years. “It’s not solving the fundamental problem of capacity within the public system.”
Darcy pointed to the Ministry of Health’s 2015 plan to improve surgical services, which found 18 per cent of operating rooms are not regularly staffed, primarily because of lack of funding.
She said a better strategy would be to maximize use of existing facilities, rather than turning to the private sector.
Jennifer Whiteside, secretary-business manager for the Hospital Employees’ Union, said increasing care shouldn’t require a capital cost for Island Health and the pool of available staff shouldn’t be moved out of hospitals.
“If a private clinic is able to staff up, then the staff is out there. Why is Island Health not utilizing those staff within the public system?” she said.
“Because there’s no question that once you start to fragment the care that people receive and separate out certain services into the private sector, there’s a risk that care will suffer.”
