The official opposition is calling for Health Minister Eric Hoskins to be fired or shuffled out of his portfolio.

The government has been hammered by both opposition parties on health-care funding in question period recently. The Progressive Conservatives began calling for Hoskins' firing Monday, after the NDP released data that shows acute care in hospitals across the province running at over 100-per-cent capacity.

"Will the premier tell us today, does she support these cuts to health care or will she shuffle out the minister of health?" asked PC Leader Patrick Brown on Monday, in one of his four questions on the same theme.

While Premier Kathleen Wynne has recently spoken about a "hypothetical cabinet shuffle," her sources who speak to media have indicated Hoskins will keep his position.

The NDP has been using data it obtained from the Ministry of Health through the Freedom of Information requests to rhetorically bash the Liberals about the legislature in recent weeks. On Monday, the PCs joined them and cited the New Democrats' data as the basis for their demand to see Hoskins shuffled out of his portfolio.

Overall, the data shows the province's acute-care bed occupancy rate has hovered between 74 per cent and 83 per cent for the 2 1/2 years, where data was requested and released, from January 2013 to June 2015.

It shows 16 hospitals were overfull (with acute-care bed occupancy rates of 100 per cent or higher) in the first quarter of 2015-16 (April to June 2015) and 29 hospitals were overfull in the fourth quarter of 2014-15 (January to March 2015.)

In the most recent reported quarter, Blind River District Health Centre had the highest acute-care occupancy rate, at 119.4 per cent. But hospitals at over 100 per cent spanned the province, and included major urban hospitals, smaller regional hospitals and specialty hospitals, such as Sick Kids in Toronto.

(See below for the most recent acute-care bed occupancy statistics released, for April to June 2015. The darker the marker, the higher the occupancy rate. Click on each hospital for its rate.)

Both opposition leaders said in question period the data means patients are being treated in hallways.

"There are labels on the hallways saying, 'hallway room one,' 'hallway room two,' 'hallway room three.' That’s what people are dealing with when they go into a hospital here in Ontario in 2016," said NDP Leader Andrea Horwath.

In question period, Hoskins replied the province has increased the number of acute care beds by 5 per cent since 2013, and allocated an additional $345 million to the hospital environment in the last budget. He said the province has been building new hospitals and improving health-care delivery at home and in their community to reduce patients' need for hospitals.

Wynne argued that — despite the occupancy rates — the results of the government's investments in health care have paid off.

"The independent Wait Time Alliance has made a statement that we’ve gone from the worst to first for reducing wait times. That’s in hip and knee replacements, cataract surgery, cardiac care, radiation oncology, MRI, CT scans and ultrasounds," said Wynne. "The Fraser Institute — let me just pause there — the Fraser Institute who are great friends of the member opposite, their 2015 Waiting Your Turn report revealed that Ontario has the second-shortest overall wait times in Canada, Mr. Speaker."

Most of the hospitals with occupancy rates over 100 per cent contacted by QP Briefing declined to comment Monday.

“We won’t provide comment because it’s not news for us, that’s the fairest way of saying it,” Peterborough Regional Health Centre communications advisor Michelene Ough. “It’s been that way as a long as I can remember.”

But Quinte Health Care was more obliging. Three of the four its hospital sites (Picton Prince Edward, Bancroft North Hastings and Trenton Memorial) reported acute care at over 100-per-cent capacity.

Vice-president and chief nursing officer Carol Smith Romeril described what that means for the hospital. She hasn't seen patients treated in hallways in her two months in her current position, she said. However, there are times when extra staff must be called in, staff will have to take on more patients than they are typically assigned and acute-care beds are set up in rooms that aren't typically hospital rooms.

"There would still be a bed and furniture there, but it's an extra room," Smith Romeril said.

Having patients treated in hallways is "something we would try to avoid," she said.

There are times when the emergency department becomes crowded, where acute patients will be on beds in the halls, she said. When the emergency department becomes concerned about bringing in new patients, it will declare "gridlock," triggering processes throughout the hospital to help increase capacity, such as discharging patients who can be discharged and bringing in extra staff.

Overall, the staff works hard to make sure capacity issues never affect patient care, Smith Romeril said.

"This is challenging work. I can't tell you how many hours are spent making sure the quality of care is not affected. It's at the top of everyone's mind who is a professional caregiver," she said. "While it's challenging to do this, I think we're able to do it well."

When the hospital surveys its acute-care patients about their experience they give a positive answer more than 90 per cent of the time, she said.

"Could we do better? Yes, we could do better. Sometimes people wait a long time for a bed and that we would definitely like to improve. But with all the hard work I think we've been successful," she said.

The NDP also released data on mental-health bed occupancy, which increased from 83 per cent to nearly 89 per cent over the same 2 1/2 years, with six to 10 hospitals 100-per-cent full at different time periods, or more, and another five or six more at 99-per-cent full at any given time.

On Monday, the NDP released new data, also requested from the Ministry of Health, on the anticipated deferred maintenance costs at the province's hospitals. The ministry released each hospital's total deferred maintenance based on assessments for health and safety requirements, code compliance and "imminent breakdown," as of last September.

The data shows 131 of the province's 148 hospitals have deferred maintenance costs of over $1 million. Eight hospitals have deferred repair costs of over $100 million. Top of the list was a hospital with costs pegged at $287,722,490 — but the hospitals' names were all redacted due to the ministry's concern that naming them would hinder the bid process for repair work.

The ministry's cover letter to the NDP on the data release explained the refusal to release the hospital names like this: "Concerns are that contractors currently engaged by hospitals could lost confidence in the facility's ability or intention to pay on current contractual obligations."

Minister Hoskins said the highest figures have two causes — in some cases they represent hospitals that have several different hospital sites in different locations, and in some cases they need unusually expensive repair work had been deferred because the hospital itself is slated for replacement.

To contact the reporter on this story:
jsmithcross@qpbriefing.com
416-212-5816
Twitter: @jessiecatherine

Opposition calls for health minister’s firing amid data debate

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