Editor:
I am writing as a long time senior manager in health care, including as a former vice president Vancouver Hospital and Health Sciences Centre and the Vancouver-Richmond health board.
I am having a lot of difficulty in understanding why the Fraser Health Authority claims it cannot afford the Delta doctors' proposal to re-establish surgical capacity at Delta Hospital. As I understand it, the proposal is very modest, involving establishing a preadmission clinic nurse position and staffing a four-bed post-surgical unit.
What would this cost?
The surgeons and the anesthesiologists costs are covered by the Medical Services Plan and do not come out of the Fraser Health Authority budget. Most importantly, restoring this capacity would mean surgical cases done at Delta would not have to be done at Royal Columbian or other FHA hospitals.
In other words, the work is being done at Delta and saving those costs at the other Fraser hospitals.
So saying you can't afford to do the surgery at Delta Hospital is a shell game - the costs are not avoided, they just show up elsewhere.
Furthermore, it is well known that other hospitals in FHA are totally overstretched and a re-established surgical capacity at Delta would reduce pressures on these hospitals as well as providing closer to home services for Delta residents.
In summary, the Fraser Health Authority's position that it can't afford this proposal doesn't really match up with the economics and simple good sense of giving Delta Hospital back its surgical capacity.
I really encourage FHA to reconsider this proposal that is really in their best interest as well as the citizens of Delta.
John Higenbottam
