Beaverlodge, Alta., residents worry that their next health-care facility won't be open 24/7
CBC
After some pushback, Alberta Health Services is now looking at the possibility of offering urgent care services 24 hours every day at a northwestern Alberta health complex slated to open in 2028.
At a community meeting in late June, residents of Beaverlodge, a town about 500 kilometres northwest of Edmonton, were told the Mountview Health Complex would have urgent care services only 16 hours each day.
The current hospital, which has been serving the town and the region since 1956, has an emergency department that's open around the clock.
In a Sept. 18 statement to CBC News, AHS said it is "committed to reviewing" a clinical service model that had been presented to the community at the June meeting.
"AHS is currently exploring the feasibility of a 24/7 urgent care facility and will also continue to monitor the health-care usage data from the area alongside sustainability of services that best meet the community's needs," the statement said.
Beaverlodge has a population of about 2,400 residents in a geographic area that includes about 10,000 more.
The plan had been for patients needing urgent care in overnight hours to be stabilized by paramedics and then taken to the Grande Prairie Regional Hospital, more than 40 kilometres to the east.
Town resident Tallie Nykolyshyn said she fears some patients may die if the new health-care complex has only 16-hour urgent care.
Nykolyshyn, who survived a stroke in 2017, said having a hospital eight minutes from her home has been life-saving in the past. It also allows her some peace of mind.
"If they were to turn around and make us go to Grande Prairie, how are they going to get extra doctors and everything to look after all the extra people that will now be going there?" she said in an interview.
"Beaverlodge [hospital] not only looks after the community, but Huallen, Wembley, Sexsmith — there are people coming from Valleyview to come to Beaverlodge because they can't get into Grande Prairie."
The Mountview Health Complex is being constructed to replace the aging Beaverlodge Municipal Hospital.
As presented to the community in June, the care model for the Mountview Health Complex includes 32 "restorative care" beds and an "advanced ambulatory care centre," which would be closed overnight.
AHS will be the main tenant at the new facility, which is being built in a public-private partnership between the Town of Beaverlodge and St. Albert, Alta., developer Landrex Inc.
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