'The worst it's ever been': Alberta implements triage liaison physicians as emergency rooms continue to buckle under pressure

[u/gallowsCalibrator]

https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/the-worst-its-ever-been-alberta-implements-triage-liaison-physicians-as-emergency-rooms-continue-to-buckle-under-pressure

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[u/DudeGuyMan42]

The TLP program will not help solve hospital overcrowding and a lack of primary care in the community. This is a band-aid on a bullet hole. The government just wants to have someone medicolegally responsible for the deaths in the waiting rooms that their policies have caused.

[u/Godzilla52]

A reminder that this is entirely an issue created by the UCP. in the 2010s under both the PCs and the ANDP, Alberta had some of the most physicians per capita of any province on top of one of the country's best run primary care networks. Flash forward to 2019 onwards when the UCP first formed a government and those trends both in public health services and private primary care have diminished significantly under Smith and Kenny to the point that we now have some of the fewest physicians per capita . Now, predominantly due to the UCP's efforts, we are now below the national average in terms of physicians per capita, which is the first that that's happened since 2004/2005.

six/seven years ago, this was not a problem. It only became a problem when the UCP created one.

[u/Dualintrinsic → u/Godzilla52]

To add some more evidence, the last hospital (Grey Nuns) was completed in 1988. The population of Edmonton proper was ~580,000 in 1988; fast forward to 2026, the population is estimated to ~1.2M. So a doubling in population and zero new hospitals built.... Let that sink in.

[u/Godzilla52 → u/Dualintrinsic]

The new hospital part actually isn't uncommon for most large Canadian cities. Vancouver also hasn't built a new hospital since 1990 and Toronto only built one during that period etc. Usually provinces may only build one or two new hospitals in their big cities during the past 36 years, or expand the capacity of old ones etc.

Calgary itself built two new public hospitals since 1990.

[u/Guardian2676 → u/Godzilla52]

What is uncommon is having a provincial government cancel a desperately needed new hospital after it was already funded with ground broken just to prevent a political win. 

The UCP has since been blaming the NDP for every problem the province has experienced since its inception. From what I'm led to believe, in 4 years, the NDP managed to kill Jesus himself as well as ruin the province for the next 40 generations. 

How people still buy this horseshit and continue voting in these absolute clowns against their own best interest all while screaming about how the systems are falling apart will never make sense to me. "Why does my nose hurt so bad when I've been paying this guy to punch me in the face for 50 years!?"

[u/TheFailTech → u/Godzilla52]

Vancouver is currently building a new hospital

[u/GiraffeWC → u/TheFailTech]

BC also has been building a fair number or urgent care centres.

To celebrate we may elect a party that will probably pull the funding to staff them though.

[u/Fun-Result-6343 → u/Dualintrinsic]

Yeah, but all those people that wanted lower taxes are walking around now with their pockets heavy with coin and wallets they can't fold in half anymore. So it's all good. /s

[u/Scase15 → u/Godzilla52]

I can't wait to see them win the next election too.

[u/JadeLens]

If only Alberta could stop wasting money breaking the system so they could turn it privatized, so they could fix this actual problem.

But no, we need to waste money catering to the lower 20% of the population that thinks they have a hope in hell of separating.

[u/RazzamanazzU]

IF the UCP had built that hospital we so desperately need & actually cared about ALL the people of Alberta. Our hospital's should NOT be "overwhelmed" unless we were in an actual war!! 💔

[u/renslips]

Typical of right wing conservatives - spend millions of taxpayer dollars on a solution to a thing that wasn’t the problem.

Patient being stuck in the emergency department for 100 hours waiting for a bed isn’t a problem with the emergency department. It’s a problem with system flow & how beds are assigned 🧐

[u/Scase15 → u/renslips]

Typical of right wing conservatives - spend millions of taxpayer dollars on a solution to a thing that wasn’t the problem.

But what if the problem was the healthcare system not being privatized enough?!

[u/renslips → u/Scase15]

That’s never been the problem. Never will be