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Checking Out Wait List Times

By Elaine Macdonald

The Province has come up with a new way to deal with the matter of surgical wait lists, a website.

You can check the site (www.health.gov.bc.ca/waitlist/)to find out how many people in any given region are on a wait list for several types of non-emergency surgery. For more detailed info, you can link up with the list of surgeons at a hospital where that type of surgery is done, and find out waiting times for each specialist.

The site outlines how patients can use the information to ask their doctor some questions: 

• “Is there a specialist who can perform the same surgery or treatment sooner?
• If the wait time for a surgery is long, could you please check the Ministry of Health's Surgical Wait Times website for another surgeon or hospital 

When asked if the Ministry of Health is now advocating a system where the patient “shops for a doc”, Ministry of Health spokesperson Carolyn Carmen replied: “For the first time, the patient and the physician have information that will help them make a decision based on the needs of the patient and the available resources.” Which certainly sounds like P.R. talk for “yes”.

For the sake of comparison, here are some of the waitlists and waiting time ranges facing patients in the 250. The median wait varies depending on the surgeon:

Place                   Procedure                 #on Waitlist         Median Wait (weeks)
Prince George   Orthopedic                      666                  4. to 18.4
Kamloops           Orthopedic                      683                 3.6 to 19.4
Kelowna              Orthopedic                      1867               6.6 to 31.4

Prince George       General Surgery         381                2.9 to 13
Kamloops              General Surgery         154                1.9 to 3.7
Kelowna                 General Surgery         786                2.1 to 11.3 






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