Opening of new Moose Jaw hospital delayed until mid-October

The opening of the new Moose Jaw hospital has been delayed until mid-October.

The opening of the new Moose Jaw Hospital has been delayed, but officials say the project remains on budget and construction is still on schedule.

The Five Hills Health Region says the facility will now open in mid-October, instead of the original target of late August.

Bert Linklater, the health region’s senior vice-president of operations, says the delay is linked to the installation of the information technology network at the new hospital.

The health region initially estimated the network would be installed 2 1/2 months after construction of the hospital is completed at the end of May.

“Now that we’re actually seeing the amount of work and have been able to lay it out on a project timeline, it’s looking more like 4 1/2 months,” Linklater told CTV News in a phone interview Wednesday.

“We can’t begin to do our final installations of some of the IT stuff and the network stuff until the building is absolutely dust-free because the dust would contaminate the network.”

Linklater says moving patients and equipment from the current hospital into the new facility will be quite an undertaking, and the transition must be seamless.

“We literally will close down the final operation of acute care services in the hospital at one moment and be completely up and running the next moment in the new hospital,” Linklater said.

“It will take us quite a few hours to accomplish that move but it won’t be spread over weeks, it will be done in a very short period of time.”

The current hospital is home to Saskatchewan’s only hyperbaric chamber, and there is concern that the life-saving equipment could be scrapped after the new facility opens.

Linklater said the future of the hyperbaric chamber is currently being discussed between the donors of the equipment and the Ministry of Health.

“We don’t know where it’s going to be used, that’s still under consideration, I think, by the ministry,” Linklater said.

“But we continue to use that equipment and we’ll use it right up until the last day that we can provide the service out of this hospital.”

The current hospital will eventually be torn down, but no date has been set for the demolition. The City of Moose Jaw will be given the first opportunity to buy the land, and if it doesn’t, the health region will look for another potential buyer.