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Twenty-one hospitals and health regions did respond to our requests with varying amounts of data, however. Their records showed 1,480 patients died while waiting for surgery in 2018-19. However, as those health bodies represent less than half of Canada’s population, the true figure is likely closer to 4,000.
The data provided to SecondStreet.org showed that patients were waiting for a variety of procedures when they passed away. Some were waiting for potentially life-saving procedures (eg. heart operations) while others were waiting for procedures that could have improved their quality of life (eg. hip operations).
The data showed patients had been waiting anywhere from less than a month when they passed away to more than eight years. In many cases, patients waited longer than the medically recommended time period. For instance, 65 per cent of the patients who passed away while waiting for surgery in Nova Scotia had been waiting longer than the recommended period.
Just imagine spending your final few years living in pain or being confined to your home.
As our data is from a period before COVID, one could reasonably assume these numbers have only gotten worse; after the pandemic hit Canada, governments postponed thousands of procedures as part of efforts to “prevent the spread.”
Addressing Canada’s surgical backlog is a complex topic, but two solutions we identified, include:
First, governments could vastly improve the data they track and disclose when it comes to patient suffering in the health care system. It’s quite astounding that governments make businesses file reports on minor workplace accidents that result in employees receiving so much as a bruise. Yet, at the same time most governments don’t track, and certainly don’t proactively disclose, information on patients dying or suffering while waiting for surgery.
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