Surgeries Continue to Be Postponed at Interior Health Hospitals, Officials Say | The Canadian News

Due to the pressures of COVID-19 in BC hospitals, hundreds of non-urgent surgeries have been canceled or postponed depending on the province.

“Every one of those surgeries is medically necessary, every one of them will be performed but they have had to be delayed due to pressures on our hospitals,” British Columbia Health Minister Adrian Dix said at a news conference Tuesday.

“During the two weeks of September 5-18, there have been 798 surgical postponements (in BC)”

In the Interior Health region, 176 surgeries were postponed last week alone.

“This is not a decision we make lightly, and our priority is to reschedule all patients as soon as possible,” Interior Health staff wrote in an email.

“This allows our hospitals to reassign available staff to other inpatient areas temporarily.”

The province is again urging BC residents to get vaccinated to help ease mounting pressures on hospital workers across the province.

“It’s not just about keeping asking them to do more,” Dix said.

“We cannot continue to ask them to make up for the devastating consequences created when people make the decision not to get vaccinated.”

Interior Health said it continues to manage a “high level” of COVID-19 activity in hospitals.

Dix has repeatedly reported that unvaccinated patients fill beds in intensive care units.

“As of Sunday night, 156 people were in intensive care in our province with COVID-19. 138 of them were not vaccinated, which means that those people, the unvaccinated, are remarkably vulnerable right now to COVID-19 and its most serious effects, ”Dix said.

Interior Health said it will continue to monitor capacity pressures and is re-evaluating surgical schedules on a weekly basis.

IHA said that as hospital pressures decrease, the number of surgical postponements will be reduced.

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