It turns out the mystery of why the time involved for one particular emergency procedure delivered in Wallaceburg is more than twice that of Chatham isn’t such a mystery at all.
Sydenham District Hospital Board Chair Sheldon Parsons said SDH directors have been trying for months to understand the reason behind part of a presentation used by the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance’s Medical Advisory Committee to justify closing Wallaceburg’s emergency department.
The procedure involves the use of “clot buster” drugs administered to patients in cardiac distress.
The CKHA presented a statistic that it takes cardiac patients 370 minutes to get from Wallaceburg to Windsor for further treatment as compared to only 162 in Chatham.
The variance was used in public presentations before services clubs, community meetings and by Dr. Indraneel Ghosh, (CKHA chief of emergency medicine), during a media conference last month.
At that time, neither Ghosh nor any members of the medical advisory committee could explain the discrepancy when questioned by the media.
Parsons said the SDH board has continued to ask Ghosh and Alliance chief of staff Dr. Ranjith Chandrasena for an explanation but have received no response.
“We checked with other ER professionals and the difference is quite easily explained,” he said.
Parsons said the SDH board found that based on standard guidelines from Windsor, a hospital within a 90-minute drive is supposed to transfer a patient immediately, which is what happens at the Chatham campus.
Since Wallaceburg isn’t within 90 minutes, protocol is that clot-buster drugs are given in Wallaceburg ER and once the patient is stabilized, they are transferred to Windsor.
Parsons said it takes one to two hours under most circumstances before patients are considered stable enough to be transferred. When they are stable, they are transferred by ambulance with a nurse, however, if the drug has been effective, there is “no race to get to Windsor in most circumstances.”
Parsons said it is “mind boggling that kind of a simple answer wasn’t known before (it was identified) as being a problem.”
“An ER professional like Dr. Ghosh ought to have known this,” Parsons said. “With all of his credentials, he ought to have known this or he should have thought to talk to ER professionals who had the answers before the doubt was cast.”
Parsons said the issue was “presented without any answers to mission and quality meetings within the CKHA and was presented to other (health care) partners as justification for the plan (to close Wallaceburg’s ER).”
“When we (SDH board) were aware this was going to go public we asked that it be presented and explained to us so we could understand it.
“The Medical Advisory Committee, under the leadership of Dr. Chandrasena informed us that was not the way he was going to proceed and then basically ignored our request,” he said.
Kris Lee, SDH board member, said following Windsor standards seemed like a logical idea.
“We’re doing what’s right and what’s expected by Windsor. How the Alliance can use this to justify closing the Wallaceburg ER is beyond me.”
Attempts to reach the CKHA for comment were not returned.
What??
That's downright deceiving the public. He knew all along what the proceedure was.