Hospital emergency doctors bail out Overcrowding at Charles LeMoyne on South Shore leads to service disruption
CHARLIE FIDELMAN, The Gazette Published: Friday, February 16, 2007 Last month, the trauma team at Charles LeMoyne Hospital resigned. Yesterday, the emergency room doctors walked off the job. Overcrowding is blocking physicians' access to examination rooms at the emergency department, said Bruno Baril, ER chief at the Longueuil hospital. Charles LeMoyne has congestion problems common to other Quebec hospitals. It has the second highest ER volume in the province, with 69,000 patients annually. But instead of shunting patients on stretchers to another holding area while they wait for beds, Charles LeMoyne's gurneyed patients are occupying ER examining rooms, Baril said. Doctors are tripping over stretchers "parked" in cubicles meant for emergency care. "We simply can't work," Baril said. Despite a 39-stretcher capacity, occupancy rose to 69 patients yesterday morning. Seven of 12 cubicles were busy - jammed with stretchers. Baril sent three of four physicians home because they were unable to work. "It's better than drinking coffee in the cafeteria," he said. He said he will continue to limit staffing to one doctor instead of four until the ER overcrowding subsides. The beleaguered South Shore hospital has yet to fix its fragile trauma unit after seven surgeons resigned last month in protest against what they called a lack of resources. The trauma unit resignations have put more pressure on the ER department, Baril said. Calling the ER situation "deplorable" and "indefensible," the provincial Health Department has asked the local health agency and the Quebec College of Physicians to intervene. Isabelle Merizzi, an aide to Health Minister Philippe Couillard, said government officials are worried about gaps in patient care and are watching the situation closely. This week's snowstorm caused many road accidents and brought 15 additional ambulances to the hospital's ER, Merizzi said. "We're investigating what happened. But this is no way to behave. You can't just slam the door like that," she said. But Baril said his department's 25 physicians and 200 nurses have been fighting against systemic overcrowding for years. Frustration peaked last summer when ER occupancy topped 145 per cent. Following much lobbying, the hospital's board of directors signed an agreement last month to accommodate no more than 49 stretchers in the ER - 10 above its official capacity. "In reality, not only does chaos persist but nothing has been done to change the situation," Baril said. "We're forced to send the doctors home." Luc Boileau, executive director of the Monteregie Health and Social Services Agency, said he's asked the doctors to return to work despite "a kind of dysfunction" between the ER department and the rest of the hospital. "We're very concerned," Boileau said. "We're taking it very seriously. "We understand what the doctors are going though, but this is not the way things should be handled. The hospital is under a lot of pressure and it's tough." One option is to delay surgeries scheduled for next week so patients now on stretchers can be admitted to the hospital, he said. [EMAIL PROTECTED] © The Gazette (Montreal) 2007 --- URG-L Pour quitter URG-L, envoyez un message a la liste ([email protected]) avec, COMME SUJET, le mot REMOVE (rien d'autre).
