No orthopedic surgeons for Hull ER

Patients rushed to the emergency ward at Gatineau's Hull hospital Thursday will have to go to Ottawa or Montreal if they need orthopedic surgery for acute injuries.

The announcement by the hospital Wednesday was the latest in a series of events highlighting a health-care shortage ina region where the population is growing quickly.

'It's very nice to grow, but it's a very big issue for Gatineau.' —Gatineau Mayor Marc Bureau

The hospital said none of its three orthopedic surgeons would be available at its emergency ward Thursday because they are burnt out and no one is available to replace them.

But the hospital's director of professional services, Michel Brazeau, said the hospital is doing the best it can under the circumstances.

"We've tried to organize to make sure that things are carried out correctly," he said. "And we have partners everywhere … who are going to help us get through the day."

While the orthopedic surgeons won't be available to perform emergency surgery, they will continue with their duties outside the emergency room, Brazeau said.

Patients who urgently need surgery will be sent to Ottawa or Montreal, he said.

Minor fractures will be stabilized with splints by emergency room doctors until the patient can be seen by an orthopedist at a day clinic.

The hospital said it will likelyexperience more days withoutorthopedic surgeons for urgent surgeriesbecause it does not have enough of the doctors to fill the emergency room schedule.

The temporary loss of orthopedic emergency services at Hull hospital comes only two days after its emergency ward temporarily reached 2½ times its official capacity, forcing the hospital to turn ambulances away to other hospitals.

And it comes less thana week after Hull hospital came close to the bottom of a ranking of Quebec hospitals by the news magazine l'Actualité.

Shortagein other parts ofOutaouais

Claude Levesque, Hull hospital's chief of cardiology, said theshortage of health-care servicesis not restricted to one hospital.

"If we look at the numbers— the number of beds per thousand of population, the resource we have for health care in Outaoauis, we see that it's less than the norm in Quebec."

L'Outaouais a l'urgence, a local group that advocates for solutions to the health-care shortage in the region,estimates there were 100,000 more people in the Outaouais than the available services can support.

Meanwhile, the census released Tuesday shows that Gatineau's population grew 8.5 per cent between 2001 and 2006, making it one of the fastest-growing regions of Quebec.

Local politicians such as Gatineau Mayor Marc Bureau acknowledge that poses a challenge for a region where health services are already strained.

"It's very nice to grow, but it's a very big issue for Gatineau," he said.