Seniors care, ER waits top health budget

Alberta's health-care agency will focus on seniors care and cutting wait times in ERs in its newly approved $11.2 billion budget.

Money will also be set aside to stabilize staffing in the budget passed by the board of Alberta Health Services (AHS) at a meeting Tuesday in Calgary.

More money will be funnelled to creating continuing care spaces for seniors, which should then free up hospital beds and ease emergency wait times, said Stephen Duckett, president and CEO of AHS.

"It will make a significant impact on our acute hospitals where there are about 700 people waiting for long-term care. That's the equivalent of adding a whole new hospital," he told reporters.

The board plans to open a medical assessment unit at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton to matcha pilot projectalready running at the Rockyview General Hospital in Calgary. The units will deal with patients who are admitted to emergency butstill waiting for a hospital bed.

When asked how improvements in emergency departmentwait times would be measured, Duckett said it was too early to say until the Edmonton unit is up and running.

"We actually don't want to put fixed targets just yet until we see how effective those things are," he replied.

The 2010/11 health budget is about $300 million more than last year. The government expunged AHS's $1.3-billion deficit in the February provincial budget and committed to stable health-care funding for five years.

In the numbers announced on Tuesday:

• $81 million will go to creating more than 1,100 continuing care beds as part of a three-year plan to add 3,000 total spaces.
• Up to $50 million will go to a program that includes cutting wait times in emergency departments.