'Someone's going to have to die': Councillors lash out over ER delays

Ottawa city councillors are taking the CEO of The Ottawa Hospital to task over emergency room delays that are tying up paramedics, sometimes leaving the city without a single available ambulance to respond to medical emergencies.

Coun. Carol Anne Meehan didn't mince words Thursday morning.

"The fact that we are having paramedics sit in the emergency room sometimes for up to seven hours and not getting that ambulance back on the road is unacceptable," Meehan said. "Someone's going to have to die actually, I think, before the hospital takes this seriously."

• 'Level zero' crisis turning deadly, city warns
• 'Hard work ahead' to alleviate ER delays, Ottawa Hospital says

Meehan and other councillors on the city's protective and community services committee were briefed on a staff report detailing how often ambulances are tied up off-loading patients at the Civic and General campuses of The Ottawa Hospital and the Queensway Carleton Hospital.

As CBC has reported, the Ottawa Paramedic Service was without a single available ambulance to respond to medical emergencies 329 times from January to August, a total of 138.4 hours.

The situation is referred to as "level zero." In one instance earlier this year the city was at level zero for seven hours and 40 minutes.

'That's how frustrated we are'

The Ottawa Hospital has responded to the city's concerns, saying it remains committed to working with the city and other partners to do the hard work necessary to reduce the transfer times, but on Thursday several councillors including Meehan pushed for the hospital's CEO, Dr. Jack Kitts, to appear before the committee.

"That's how frustrated we are. We want to hear from him why this problem cannot be tackled," Meehan said. "I understand that there is a shortage of nurses and I understand that the system is overloaded. But the fact of the matter is the Ottawa Hospital is taking advantage of us, and that's not right."

In the end the committee agreed to ask Kitts to meet with Mayor Jim Watson and Coun. Jenna Sudds, who chairs the committee, to discuss possible solutions.

The three already met in the summer to discuss the issue. Among the proposed solutions at that time was the hiring of an ER-based paramedic to assist hospital staff and help get ambulances back out on the road.

Proposal hit roadblock

But according to the city's general manager of emergency and protective services, Anthony Di Monte, that idea ran into a jurisdictional roadblock because anyone providing medical care at a hospital must receive credentials from that same hospital, even if they're already a qualified nurse or doctor.

"The initiatives have now fallen to the wayside," Di Monte said Thursday. "It's like Groundhog Day and we're back to square one."

In a statement to CBC Thursday, The Ottawa Hospital said: "We welcome this opportunity to work with City elected officials and health-care partners on solutions that focus on the patient and make the best use of paramedic and hospital resources so that we can work together to reduce ambulance offload and Emergency Department wait times throughout the region."