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This is a forwarded message
From: Paul Parks <<mailto:pparks@ualberta.ca>pparks@ualberta.ca>
To: <mailto:ahsb.admin@albertahealthservices.ca>ahsb.admin@albertahealthservices.ca,
<mailto:chris.eagle@calgaryhealthregion.ca>chris.eagle@calgaryhealthregion.ca,
<mailto:paddy.meade@hbas.ca>paddy.meade@hbas.ca,
<mailto:Paddy.Meade@gov.ab.ca>Paddy.Meade@gov.ab.ca
Date: Friday, September 19, 2008, 1:44:10 AM
Subject: Sub‐optimal health care outcomes due to systemic overcrowding
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Dear Alberta Health Services Executives,
I'm writing to solicit your immediate assistance with the ongoing
crisis in system‐wide overcrowding within the acute care facilities in
Edmonton.
Please find attached ongoing documentation of significant morbidity
and mortality directly related to ED and system overcrowding. In the
last nine months, this is the fourth such document our group has
submitted to Capital Health Regional Executives and to provincial
health authorities. The standard of care our group can provide
continues to to be significantly compromised by the boarding of
admitted patients within the EDs.
Despite being rather lengthy, the list is only a small sampling of the
direct impact of systemic overcrowding on our ability to provide care
to the patients within our region.
30 admitted emergency in‐patients (EIPs) has become our frequent
baseline, and with upcoming predictable winter spikes in volumes of
admitted sick patients we could be facing greater than 40 EIPs in a 45
bed ED. With the other ED's in the city in similar situations we are
truly facing a situation where the patients within our region will
have no reasonable expectation of timely access to acute emergency
care.
Our group has been very active in working with
local/regional/provincial authorities to address this crisis, but
despite best efforts to date things continue to deteriorate. We are
fully aware of (and supportive of) the efforts to bring an AHS
emergency integration team on‐line to address the long term solutions
to this crisis, but something must be done immediately to mitigate
this ongoing disaster.
Thank you in advance for taking the time to reply to this email.
Access to timely standard levels of acute care for Alberta's citizens
must be this board's top priority. Our group is anxious to work with
yourselves to address this emergent crisis.
Dr. Paul Parks mailto:<mailto:pparks@ualberta.ca>pparks@ualberta.ca
Emergency Medicine
University of Alberta Hospital
on behalf of the GEMS Emergency Physician Group
Personal Contact numbers:
Home: 780‐433‐9621
Cell: 780‐238‐9621
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