health-sciences-association-sask

The Health Sciences Association of Saskatchewan is calling for an independent review into rural EMS services.

"We're in a critical stage that ambulance services need to be looked at from our point of view," said HSAS President Karen Wasylenko. "The Provincial Auditor should investigate and review how the health regions are managing these critical health services."

Wasylenko says they believe ambulance services in rural and remote communities is dangerously understaffed and poorly managed in many health regions, including the Cypress Health Region.

"For example, in the Cypress Health Region, what we were told by former staff who used to be working in the region that a decade ago, there were 60-plus EMS staff working, and it's depleted right down to just over 34," she said. "With the population growing in Saskatchewan, this is a very critical health service that we are very concerned about, without having adequate numbers of staff."

Other specific examples noted by HSAS included that the town of Porcupine Plain in the Kelsey Trail Health Region has been without ambulance service for ten full days and nine partial days in the last four months due to a lack of staff, and the town of Hudson Bay was without EMS service for four partial days in that same period. Also, they say EMS staff serving communities in east-central Saskatchewan have gone without minimum ambulance staffing levels because EMS workers have regularly been pulled to cover staff shortages at a collaborative emergency centre in Canora, noting that the city of Melville often has only one fully-staffed ambulance serving them instead of the usual two.

Wasylenko adds there are also a large number of vacancies for EMT positions throughout the province, despite health regions reporting no issues with service delivery related to staff recruitment or retention.

"That's why we want the Provincial Auditor involved to look at this, because maybe it can say to the health regions that we want to know how many full-time, part-time and casual staff they have, and what kinds of services they are providing from community to community," she said. "What is happening is in the Market Supplement Review Report, the Health regions are reporting one set of numbers, and they say there's no issues or concerns. After the report is released, as an example in one of the health regions, all of a sudden there were all these postings for unfilled positions.

"We've tried to meet with them through our staff and discuss this, we know this is an issue and we've met very little or limited resistance to this kind of thing, but there is a huge concern," Wasylenko added. "They need to address this and explain to the public what they can expect if there is an emergency, and an ambulance is not available, or the EMS people can't get to them in a timely fashion."

The Health Sciences Association of Saskatchewan represents over 3000 healthcare professionals, including EMS personnel, in all 12 health regions.

Please Note: Swift Current EMS is not associated with the above story. They are a private company hired out by the Cypress Health Region.