The number of surgeries performed in Saskatchewan dropped by more than 10,000 during the first two months of the COVID-19 pandemic compared to the year before.
The Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) says from March 25 to May 25 this year, 4,874 surgeries were performed in the province, a decline of 10,977 from the 15,851 performed during the same period last year.
SHA spokeswoman Lisa Thomson said in an email that about 9,000 of these delayed surgeries are elective procedures, specifically hip replacements and cataract surgeries.
The SHA began to postpone elective and non-urgent surgeries on March 19 and resumed some of these procedures two months later as part of the first phase of the strategy to restore health services.
“Since resumption of phase one, more than a thousand surgeries have already been performed, including oncology (cancer) surgeries,” Thomson said in the email.
As of April 30, 14,922 patients were waiting more than three months for surgery and 13,767 were not offered surgery within three months, according to Saskatchewan Surgical Initiative numbers.
Most of these patients were located in the former Saskatoon health region, including 8,533 waiting more than three months and 7,739 with no offer of surgery within three months.
About 2,700 patients have been added to this list since March 1 due to COVID-19, Thomson said.
The second phase of the SHA plan to resume services started on Tuesday with the opening of specialty clinics and a plan to increase the capacity to perform surgeries.
During the second phase, surgical capacity is expected to expand from about half of what it was prior to the pandemic to between 65 per cent and 70 per cent, Thomson noted.
A legislative committee heard Monday that the 14,922 people with more than a three-month wait for surgery represented an increase of more than 5,000 over the similar number from April 30 last year of 9,760.
Mark Wyatt, assistant deputy minister for the Ministry of Health, told the Standing Committee on Human Services that most of the difference was linked to COVID-19.
About 1,000 surgeries are performed in the province each week, Wyatt added.
“We have absolutely seen a large increase in the number of patients waiting for all surgeries across the board,” Wyatt said. He noted that three-week urgent and emergency surgeries continued in Saskatchewan, while some provinces discontinued some of these procedures amid the pandemic.
NDP Opposition health critic Vicki Mowat said in an interview on Tuesday that patients awaiting elective procedures can experience a lot of pain.
“They don’t necessarily feel optional for these folks,” she said.
Mowat suggested the $118 million the SHA reported in savings over last year due to fewer surgeries during the pandemic should be used to bridge the gap.
On April 30, there were 26,641 people awaiting surgery in the province.
