Winnipeg man gets hip surgery done privately, suggests incentive program

An x-ray image of Robert Massey's hip that needed to be replaced. (Michelle Gerwing/CTV News Winnipeg)

On October 23, Robert Massey was in so much pain he was not able to sleep through the night or go for a walk.

Now he’s back to doing both because he got his left hip replacement done privately on December 9 at a Calgary clinic.

“My life changed December 10th, and I imagine in another month, I’ll be back to normal,” he told CTV News Winnipeg on Tuesday.

The Winnipeg man had been waiting for a surgery date in Manitoba since September of 2020 and decided to pay for it out-of-pocket as the COVID-19 pandemic forced the province to delay non-urgent and elective surgeries.

“I’m still actually waiting here in Manitoba, I am still on the waitlist and I haven’t heard a thing,” he said.

“They’re actually cancelling cardiac procedures, so you know that hip replacements are way down the list.”

Before the holiday season, Shared Health announced that surgeries will be completed on a priority basis, meaning other scheduled procedures considered elective or non-urgent were bumped to make room for more urgent procedures.

Endoscopy suites in rural areas of Manitoba were also scaled back to allow for staff to be redeployed to assist COVID-19 patients

Massey said even though doing his hip replacement privately was expensive, it was worth it because he is off the heavy painkillers.

The other noticeable benefit is he can sleep through the night.

“I don’t wake up several times a night every time I turn, that’s the biggest thing is being able to sleep again. There’s no pain, there’s a bit of stiffness in the joint but it’s only been less than three weeks,” he said.

“It’s amazing, it’s life-changing and I am so glad I did it, I can’t tell you, just to walk again it’s crazy.”

Now that he is back home recovering, he encourages others who are waiting to consider getting their hip or knee replacement done privately.

“It’s expensive, but you can’t put a price on a quality of life,” he said.

Massey started the process on October 23, and on November 12, his surgery date was booked for December 9.

He said he won’t be submitting his bill to the province because he knows he won’t be getting anything back, but he would like to see a government incentive program to make private surgery more accessible for patients on long waitlists.

“I think they need to recognize that there are some people out there that are helping reduce the backlog and the surgery wait by doing this themselves,” Massey said.

Massey is now focused on doing his post-op physiotherapy so he can return to work.

The last estimate from Doctors Manitoba on Dec. 8 puts the pandemic backlog of surgery and diagnostic procedures at more than 150,000 in Manitoba.