Long wait times for surgery across Canada surgery, across, times, Canada, wait

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Long wait times for surgery across Canada
BC tied for third
Tamara Slobogean Dec 06, 2010 06:35:58 AM
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VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) - It got better and then it got worse.  Once again, we are waiting longer to go under a surgeon's knife in Canada.  The latest numbers on wait times from the Fraser Institute show that in 2010 Canadians waited about four and a half months to have surgery.

It's the first increase since 2007 and the second-longest wait time ever recorded.  The wait times this year were pegged at 18.2 weeks, as opposed to three years ago when it was 18.3 weeks.

Mark Rovere with the Institute says it's time to look at other examples about how to finance health care.  "If we were to look at these other OECD countries for different ways to improve the health care system, we would find that majority of them do not prohibit the use of private insurance for medically necessary services.  Almost all of them have some sort of cautionary, so whether it is user fee or a health care deductible."

Wait times are shortest in Ontario and longest in Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick.  Quebec and BC rank third with wait times by referral at 18.8 weeks.