Surgeries return to pre-pandemic levels in B.C.

In the second year of the surgical renewal commitment, B.C. has returned to, and is exceeding, pre-pandemic surgery levels.

On March 16, 2020, non-urgent scheduled surgeries were postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Non-urgent surgeries resumed on May 18, 2020, but there were additional postponements caused by waves of the virus, extreme weather and staff illness.

On May 7, 2021, the province committed to get the patients who had faced those postponements and delays back into the hospital for their non-urgent procedures.

As of March 31, 2022, 99.8 per cent of patients whose scheduled surgeries were postponed during the first wave have had their surgeries; 96.2 per cent of patients whose scheduled surgeries were postponed during the second and third wave have had their surgeries; and 78.9 per cent of patients who had their surgeries postponed under the fourth and fifth wave, and still wanted surgical treatment, have had their procedures.

In the second year of the surgical renewal commitment, the province saw 52,216 urgent scheduled surgeries completed, which is 5.3 per cent more than the same time frame in Year 1 of the commitment and 7.1 per cent more than pre-COVID 2019-20.

There were also 201,880 non-urgent scheduled surgeries in year two, 5.3 per cent more than the previous year and 1.5 per cent more than in 2019-20.

The province saw 337,560 scheduled and unscheduled surgeries completed in Year 2, which was 6.7 per cent more than Year 1 and 2.2. per cent above 2019-20.

“Through the dedicated efforts of everyone involved in delivering surgeries and the actions by British Columbians to slow the rapid spread of COVID-19 and ease pressures on our hospitals, over 337,000 surgeries were completed in the 12-month period ending March 31 — the most surgeries ever completed in a single year in B.C.,” said Adrian Dix, Minister of Health.

“Every surgery is life-changing for the patient who receives it, and that’s why we made our surgical renewal commitment to patients.”

Additionally, there was a total of 586,657 operating room hours in Year 2, which was up 17,341 hours from the previous year. It was noted that Year 1 also had 13,627 more operating room hours compared to pre-pandemic figures.

Year 2 of the commitment also saw wait list size for both urgent and non-urgent cases decrease by 5.9 per cent compared to March 31 of 2019, and the total wait list size was down 11.4 per cent from it’s peak on May 28, 2020.

The province also noted an additional 400 perioperative nurses and 100 medical-device reprocessing technicians completed their training in the second year of the committment.

“These are significant achievements in fulfilling the commitment,” Dix said.

“But our work is not done. No health-care system that comes through COVID-19 is renewed or restored at the dropping of restrictions, the easing of measures or the flicking of a switch. We know that the impacts of the pandemic were not uniform across the surgical system. The work ahead of us now is to build on these achievements, continue to overcome our challenges and find new opportunities to deliver the surgeries patients need,” the minister stated.