Emergency rooms in eastern Ontario are under pressure and overcapacity

Hospitals across the region are overcapacity and warning of long wait times already, with flu season only just starting. CTV’s Tyler Fleming reports.

Hospitals across eastern Ontario are warning of rising pressure as emergency rooms face longer waits, even before flu season reaches full strength.

In Smiths Falls, Annika Hamilton says she’s now slowly recovering from a stubborn bug, describing it as “a lung cold.” Earlier this week her symptoms sent her to the emergency department at the Perth and Smiths Falls District Hospital, where she waited several hours.

“It was three hours, four hours maybe,” she says. “I know people have had it much worse.”

Her partner, Shane McMillan, says the ER waiting room had become packed as they were leaving the hospital.

“It was brutal,” he says. “Very busy. No seats anywhere.”

Smiths Falls hospital cites critical capacity pressures

The Perth and Smiths Falls District Hospital says it’s dealing with ‘severe capacity challenges’ caused by a shortage of inpatient beds.

In a public notice posted on its webpage, the hospital says emergency patients are being prioritized based on the severity of their condition, meaning longer waits for non-urgent cases, and that staff are working “under extraordinary pressure.”

The hospital is urging patience and respect for employees.

McMillan says long waits have become common.

“Our buddy, he was there just a couple days after, and he had to wait for five hours just for a simple prescription,” he says.

Ottawa Hospital reporting longer ER waits, high patient volumes

The Ottawa Hospital says both its Civic and General campuses are seeing high patient volumes that have led to longer emergency wait times. The hospital says it is prioritizing the most urgent cases to ensure they receive timely care, while teams work through a backlog of patients waiting for inpatient beds.

It says staff are working with regional partners “to help balance patient volumes and maintain access to care for everyone who needs it.”

With flu season only beginning, and COVID-19 and RSV already circulating, health officials warn the system may face additional pressure in the weeks ahead.

“Doctors, nurses, health professionals, all of whom we’re short on, combined with the flu season,” says Natalie Mehra, executive director of the Ontario Health Coalition, adding many hospitals, particularly in Ottawa, routinely operate at or above full capacity. “Surgeries get cancelled because there are no beds available. Emerge departments back up because there are no beds available. Ambulances back up and have to wait to offload their patients because there are no beds available. It screws up the whole system.”

Mehra says hospitals are being pushed to the limit because funding hasn’t kept pace with rising demand, forcing them to shoulder primary-care gaps, manage constant surges and try to expand capacity without the resources to do it.

“Year after year we’re asked to do more with the same resources,” she says, “and without proper, predictable funding, the system simply can’t keep up.”

Dr. Paul Roumeliotis, medical officer of health for the Eastern Ontario Health Unit, says respiratory outbreaks are currently dominated by COVID-19 and cold viruses, but flu and RSV are expected to increase in the coming weeks.

“It’s hard for people not to go to the emergency room when they have nowhere else to go,” he says, adding that hospitals are triaging patients, shifting staff and moving people between wards, but they cannot solve the lack of family doctors or the shortage of after-hours clinics.

“I think this is a harbinger of things to come and I do believe that the hospitals are going to get even more overwhelmed for lack of a better word ... If we increase collectively the uptake of our vaccines, all of those three things will actually decrease the burden in the hospitals, and in fact, decrease the burden of illness in our community.”

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