Calgary Emergency Rooms Face Critical Overcapacity Ahead of Flu Season Peak

Calgary emergency rooms are “in a state of critical overcapacity” ahead of the anticipated peak of flu season – and to cope wiht the surge and wait-room crowding, officials are urging doctors to speed up their decisions on whether to admit patients, according to a memo obtained by CBC News.

The situation is “only expected to worsen,” according to the note sent Friday to Calgary acute care doctors.

“While all sites are mobilizing all available resources, we are consistently operating in an environment where all funded ED (emergency department) treatment spaces are occupied by admitted patients, leading to severe access block,” wrote Dr. Catherine Patocka, the clinical department head of emergency medicine for Alberta Health Services’ Calgary zone, along with her deputy, Dr. James Andruchow.

Adding to the crunch and staff strain is a current mandate for paramedics to quickly offload patients in emergency rooms to let those ambulance crews handle additional calls, the memo states.

“This combination of extreme overcapacity and unpredictable influxes of seriously ill patients from EMS results in prolonged delays in care and major safety risks for … patients awaiting assessment and treatment.”

Officials had warned about the risks of overcrowded hospital emergency wards during respiratory virus season. Hours before this “critical overcapacity” memo was circulated in Calgary hospitals last Friday, Hospital Services minister Matt Jones said officials had expected Alberta’s influenza season to peak on Dec. 21, with hospitalizations to continue rising for an additional week.

The respiratory disease known as RSV, which can also send patients to hospital, is forecast to keep rising until Jan. 11, according to provincial modelling.

The memo states that to help keep patients safe and improve system flow, they will ask residents and attending physicians to take no longer than four hours for “disposition decisions” – whether to admit or discharge patients.

Doctors will receive special alerts regarding that target, and emergency department administrators may step in to help if any decision goes beyond the four-hour mark, the memo states.

“While we recognize ther may be no available inpatient beds,i