(L-R) Luanne Metz, Alberta NDP Critic for Emergency & Surgical Care, with local Red Deer resident Jaelene Tweedle. (Alberta NDP)

By rdnewsNOW staff

"Tarps Held Up With Duct Tape"

Alberta NDP demands action on Red Deer Hospital expansion and Emergency Room space

Jan 9, 2024 | 11:41 AM

Alberta’s NDP is demanding immediate action and a definitive timeline to build the Red Deer Hospital expansion after it was revealed on Monday that staff at the existing hospital have been forced to use tarps held up with duct tape to create further emergency assessment spaces.

Local resident Jaelene Tweedle arrived at Red Deer Hospital at 3:30 a.m. on Dec. 21 and says she waited five hours in the emergency waiting room area first. Then, she was moved to an assessment space and observed a series of confined spaces made using the tarp and tape.

“It was something out of a Hollywood movie set during a pandemic,” Tweedle said. “Public healthcare must be there for every Albertan — and it’s simply not for Red Deer residents. The availability of it seems to be growing even more uncertain for Red Deer residents, and the hundreds of thousands of others who depend on the Red Deer Regional Hospital.

“Trips to an emergency room are usually a last resort and come with added stress and uncertainty. And to see our frontline staff and patients working in and being treated under conditions that are nowhere near optimal, was concerning.”

Luanne Metz, Alberta NDP Critic for Emergency & Surgical Care, joined Tweedle for a news conference in Red Deer Monday. She demanded a better solution to expand space in the emergency room.

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“Could we create a more permanent emergency space within the hospital?” Metz said.

“Will we focus on prevention to reduce the load on our emergency departments?

“We should be actually supporting primary care (not just repeatedly promising to do so). We should be preventing respiratory illness. A proper immunization campaign would go a long way. This should include RSV immunization in some cases. Other measures should also be considered. We should ensure proper ventilation in places where infections spread, like schools, and use data to implement mask requirements when needed in hospitals and congregate living facilities.”

Metz added the long-term solution in Red Deer specifically is to build the hospital expansion, which was first promised by the UCP in 2020. Construction was to begin in 2021 but still has yet to start.

“Then, Danielle Smith appointed (Adriana) LaGrange the Health Minister and the people of this city again hoped that would lead to good news for their much-needed hospital, but it wasn’t even mentioned in the mandate letter given to her back in July,” Metzi said.

“Adriana LaGrange must come forward and apologize on behalf of her government for failing her own constituents so bad while serving as the Health Minister. And when she issues that apology, we’re also demanding she come forward with a real plan and timeline and funding to build the Red Deer Hospital expansion. No more excuses and no more delays.”

Tweedle said a friend of hers was admitted to Red Deer Hospital late last week but now will be sent to Calgary or Edmonton for an MRI as there isn’t a functioning one in the city.

“That’s right, no MRI, in a full-sized city with one of the busiest emergency rooms in Alberta,” Tweedle said.

Heather Kipling, Communications Director, AHS Central Zone, says the MRI machine at RDRHC came back into full operation as of 3 p.m. on Monday.

“The MRI was temporarily unavailable due to an unexpected issue with a component that needed repair over the weekend. Patients who had scheduled appointments have been contacted directly and will have their appointments rebooked. Some have been scheduled for this evening.”

“Red Deer Regional Hospital Centre’s (RDRHC) Emergency Department (ED) continues to see high patient volumes, as do all of our major urban hospitals. This is not unusual at this time of year, due to the respiratory illness season,” added Kipling.

“In order to provide patients with some privacy during their visit to the ED, some temporary mobile dividers have been erected between some chairs in the ED fast-track area, as needed.

“These temporary dividers also help limit transmission of respiratory illnesses.

“AHS is doing all it can to ensure we continue to provide patients with the care they need, while reducing the risk of transmission and making patients as comfortable as possible.

“AHS has ordered more permanent dividers which will be installed as a long-term solution,” notes Kipling.

Metz, meanwhile, said the UCP also needs to do more work at assessing and addressing issues upstream that lead to emergency room visits, such as unhoused Albertans and those struggling with mental health and addiction.

“This crisis goes well beyond the Red Deer emergency room and Red Deer in general,” she said. “There is a provincewide shortage of doctors, nurses, paramedics and another frontline healthcare workers.

“There is a serious lack of support for the frontline workers we do have and there are virtually no public health measures to reduce the serious impact of respiratory illnesses.

In response, a statement from the Office of the Minister of Health reads, “The NDP are intentionally trying to mislead Albertans. Non-ICU adult occupancy in the central zone is at 74 per cent. While the emergency department at RDRHC is experiencing high patient demand, like all hospitals across the country, patients continue to receive care when and where they need it. Nobody will be turned away if they need urgent care.

“At $1.8 billion, the Red Deer Hospital Centre redevelopment is one of the largest health care projects that the Alberta government has ever undertaken. We are committed to completing this project quickly, without compromising quality, which is why we committed an additional $321 million over three years for redevelopment in budget 2023.

“This project is on time, and is currently in the design stage, and we expect schematics to complete in the new year. There are three major construction phases: construction of an ambulatory care building, a new inpatient tower, and an expansion and renovation of the existing hospital’s main building. It is important to note that the Red Deer Hospital expansion was removed from the capital list by the NDP during their term in government. Our government looks forward to delivering a facility that meets the needs of the region now and in the future.”

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