About 150 people attended another community meeting about Delta Hospital Saturday.
The afternoon gathering at the South Delta Recreation Centre was organized by Friends of Delta Hospital, which has been working with the Delta Hospital Medical Staff Association. The citizens’ group formed a few months ago after the doctors first raised concern about the level of care at the facility, particularly the limitations of surgical program which was never fully restored after cuts over a decade ago.
Friends of Delta Hospital and the doctors say Delta is not getting its fair share of funding from Fraser Health and as a result the hospital is in crisis.
Saying Fraser Health has misled Health Minster Terry Lake when it comes to the safety and feasibility of adding at least four surgical beds, Dr. Robert Shaw told the audience a meeting has finally been set up with the health minister on May 19.
Friends of Delta Hospital’s Doug Massey was among the other speakers calling for more equitable treatment for the hospital, agreeing that having the four extra surgical beds would be a good start.
The group’s Nicholas Wong noted they’ve already gathered about 11,00 names on a petition. Delta South MLA Vicki Huntington said the community has to keep up the pressure.
Mayor Lois Jackson and TFN Chief Bryce Williams recently signed a joint letter of support for hospital. The letter addressed to Lake urges the province "to take immediate steps to address service level shortfalls at Delta Hospital."
In a recent letter to Jackson, Fraser Health noted that it was able to perform over 800 additional surgeries, such as cataract and knee surgeries, across the region between January and the end of March. That’s in addition to the 20,700 procedures normally performed over the same period. There were also 3,400 additional medical imaging scans.
However, doctors at Delta Hospital say the biggest problem is the early closing hour for the operating rooms here. It means those who arrive at the emergency department requiring urgent medical procedures have to be transferred to another hospital that has a bed. They say that’s an unnecessary and costly delay in patient care when many emergency procedures could be done at the local hospital. The doctors are asking for the four additional acute beds to start restoring services.
Lake recently said Delta Hospital is one of a number of hospitals that provide a network of supports and it’s important that any services provided compliment services and supports being provided across the region.
