No Downtown Hospital for EXPO 2005

EXPO 2005

No Downtown Hospital For EXPO 2005

The General Hospital is the hub site that is best accessed from all areas of the city by using public transit, care, walking and helicopter from Southern Alberta and B.C. The General Hospital's heli-pad has the best accessability of any of the other hospitals. Other sites are overbuilt, crowded, hard to access due to the traffic. How, with all these problems, will visitors to Expo 2005, Stampede, Police & Fire Games etc. receive emergency care without a downtown hospital?

TRAUMA

One Trauma Centre for close to a million people

The CRHA plans for only one trauma centre for Calgary located at the Foothills Hospital, for a population of nearly 800,000 and growing by about 8,000 yearly. Oklahoma City, the site of the bombing, has 10 trauma centres with a population of 400,000, half that of Calgary. The proposed single trauma centre at the Foothills Hospital services 800,000 Calgary residents and those in Southern Alberta and B.C. as well. What happens if we have a disaster or the hospital is forced to close?

EMERGENCY MEDICAL SERVICES

Increased travel time + inner city left with no emergency service

EMS times have increased. The General Hospital presently handles 35% of the emergency calls. The proposed closure of the General will increase travel times going to the peripheral hospitals. The recent upgrading of the Peter Lougheed Hospital Emergency will not solve the problem of emergency care for the high population of the inner city and the distances that those who don't have a car will have to travel.

BED SHORTAGES

Musical Beds + 110% bookings + Patient transfers

The philosophy of hospital bed bookings appears to be similar to those of a hotel - book at 110% capacity. This results in numerous transfers. Patients are admitted to hospitals where a bed is available, but their own doctor may not practice, which results in patients being transferred elsewhere to receive treatment and then being transferred back. A patient taken by ambulance to one hospital, only to be sent to another hospital where a bed is available. Patients being transferred 1 - 6 times is very common. Often there is an announcement of numerous beds being available yet health care workers claim there are no beds. There have been periods when surgery has been cancelled due to lack of available beds. This is "musical beds".