Winnipeg doctors say recent chaos in local emergency rooms more than just ‘tech problems’
All three city ERs were forced to redirect patients Thursday night according to doctors who spoke to Global News, after what the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority calls a system-wide computer crash.
The WRHA and Shared Health said its hospitals were dealing with an issue with Citrix, the main information storage platform used to create an electronic patient record and house test results and other patient data.
It said it forced all sites to implement “downtime protocols” to continue patient care as the technical support teams and the service provider worked to get Citrix back up and running.
However, two local doctors said it has more to do with changes to the health care system over the past three years and the inability to keep up with patient volumes.
“(Before) there for sure would be days where people would sit and wait for a really long time,” one doctor told Global News. “That happens more often now. Ambulances get backed up… it’s a trickle down effect.”
Both doctors spoke to Global News on condition of anonymity, for fear of losing their jobs for speaking out.
One said both Health Sciences Centre and St. Boniface hospitals were forced to redirect ambulances to the Grace Hospital for hours after patient volumes hit critical levels. However, that lead to the Grace quickly filling up and becoming overwhelmed and also going on redirect.
“So the three ER’s were rotating on redirect. Wait times were through the roof.”
According to sources, patients were not being triaged in a timely manner, ambulances were unable to offload patients and urgent care centres were being “bombarded” with patients.
“Grace ER had to call in an extra doctor overnight to help relieve the backup,” said one source.
“Last night was not a good time to be sick in Winnipeg.”
Shared Health confirmed the system-wide computer crash, but didn’t elaborate on what happened or how.
“We (were) experiencing an issue accessing data on our enterprise storage services,” said a spokesperson for Shared Health. “This (caused) some delays and challenges in accessing computerized data and electronic patient charts.”
“It’s catastrophic when that happens,” the doctor said. “But those sites are getting crushed and the (crash) only amplified that.”
The system crash also means wait times are not available online at the moment.
“It’s frustrating and I wouldn’t blame anyone for this mess right now,” the doctor said. “But when you see the (Pallister) government trying to spin it like everything is going well.. it’s just not true.”
“To be fair, they inherited a mess and the whole system is broken. It’s can’t be turned around quickly. But to say wait times are down and everything is going well… It’s blatantly lying.”
Another Winnipeg doctor agreed that the chaos is more than just a computer shut down, describing it as “an absolute shit show” and said at times they have “to assess critically ill patients in chairs.”
“This is only the beginning… come flu-season the system will be pushed to the brink of failure.”
“There is currently no plan, despite physicians, nurses warning of the inevitable, from Shared Health. The system has failed. People will be hurt. It’s only a matter of time.”
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