Fresh statistics reveal a disturbing trend in Canadian healthcare. More Canadians than previously reported are leaving emergency rooms without getting treated, an issue that significantly increased within the past year.
In a request for recently updated data for the fiscal year 2022-2023, CTV News unveiled facts that were not present in the most recent Canadian for Health Information (CIHI) report.
CIHI staff confirmed the daunting figures that underscore this issue: over 1.3 million Canadians exited emergency rooms post-registration for care between April 1, 2022, and March 30, 2023. The metric exemplifies a 34 per cent surge in the count of Canadians abandoning extended ER waits within a single year compared against data from 2021-2022, which showed 963,000 such incidents.
What does this imply? It indicates that 8.6 per cent out of 15.1 million Canadians that sought care in emergency wards exited without receiving medical attention, depicting an upward trend from 6.8 per cent in 2021-2022 fiscal year, in which 14.1 million patients registered at ERs.
Dr. Catherine Varner, a Toronto-based Emergency Physician and the deputy editor of the Canadian Medical Association Journal, gave voice to her concerns over the escalating issue: “Patients arriving in EDs across Canada find themselves in bustling and congested waiting rooms. Discontent grows with our failure to deliver prompt, efficient care, resulting in their departure.”
Her dread escalates further. “The most alarming aspect is the likelihood of those leaving without receiving medical care facing severe repercussions or even death from the ailments initially prompting them to seek care,” Varner said in a somber note. These insights make it evident that emergency healthcare services in Canada are strained and would benefit from targeted actions to improve efficiency and patient care.
