Yes.
Evidence of meeting #32 for Health in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was pediatric.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #32 for Health in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was pediatric.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:35 p.m.
Clinician Scientist, Department of Pediatrics, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
Yes.
12:35 p.m.
President, McMaster Children's Hospital, and Chair of the Board of Directors, Children's Healthcare Canada
Yes.
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
12:35 p.m.
Chief of Surgery, Hospital for Sick Children
I think the most important thing is to see children's health care as a very top priority, and I'm not sure that's universally accepted, so I think that's the first thing.
The second thing, I think, is encouraging investment in regional approaches in terms of how health care is delivered. The physicians are willing, so we are willing to have the first available surgeon and the patient on the longest wait-list—whoever is most appropriate to look after that patient.... However, we need to be integrated across hospitals in order to do that properly.
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
Marcus Powlowski Liberal Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON
I see Mr. Squires' and Dr. Doan's hands up. Do they want to answer the same question?
12:35 p.m.
President, McMaster Children's Hospital, and Chair of the Board of Directors, Children's Healthcare Canada
Yes, if I could, just really quickly. I absolutely support Dr. Drake's responses but would add that, yes, the answer is that additional investment in an under-resourced children's health system would make a difference.
I just want to highlight for this table how small our current investment is in children's health as a percentage of the overall investment in health care across Canada. Specific to Ontario, the Children's Health Coalition, which includes all the children's hospitals and the organizations representing child development institutions and community mental health agencies, put forward a plan to really address making kids count and improving our children's health system.
The total cost is about $250 million per year, perhaps a little bit more. That's relative to a $75-billion health care budget in Ontario, so if you think about those numbers across the country, it's a relatively small amount that will make a difference.
12:35 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Mr. Squires.
Dr. Doan, I know you want in on this. We're past time, so if you could be succinct, it would be greatly appreciated.
12:35 p.m.
Clinician Scientist, Department of Pediatrics, University of British Columbia, As an Individual
Thank you, yes.
I just want to add that you can't look at any one of these problems independent of the others. They're balancing measures. It's not just the OR time. Once they're done the operation, they occupy a bed for some days. That's a bed that we can't admit a sick patient from the emergency department up to. Everything has to be balanced at the same time.
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you very much, Dr. Doan.
Mr. Garon, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.
12:40 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I will leave Mr. Munter alone for a few minutes.
Dr. Drake, when we...
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Just a moment, Mr. Garon.
Mr. Garon and Mr. Munter, the rule of thumb in the committee is that the witness is allowed as much time to answer the question as the person posing the question takes, with some flexibility.
You may start over, and I will interrupt the witness if I have to.
12:40 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
I am not sure I understand what you just said, Mr. Chair. Could you repeat it?
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
I said that, according to committee rules, witnesses may give an answer that is long as the question.
12:40 p.m.
Bloc
12:40 p.m.
Voices
Ha, ha!
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
12:40 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
Dr. Drake, looking at rising costs to health care systems in recent years, we see that inflation or real economic growth of 2% or 3% used to cause a cost increase of 5%, 6%, or 7% to health care systems, depending on the province.
Please tell us what role the increasing cost of acquiring new technologies plays in these rising costs for health care systems.
12:40 p.m.
Chief of Surgery, Hospital for Sick Children
That's a really important question. In fact, the technology that's used in health care has a cost increase that's well above the annual rate of inflation, so the technology costs typically increase on the order of 5% to 10% per year. It's something that we really struggle with in trying to have the most updated technology for our patients as we absolutely can. It's also worth saying that most of the technology that's developed in the health care system is developed for adults, because children represent a smaller proportion of the patients who are receiving care.
We have to adapt adult health care to children, and it's not a simple translation. It's really important that we stay current in terms of our health care technology. For example, we all struggle with having the most up-to-date MRI scanner or the most up-to-date nuclear medicine scanner and so on, and it's the same with operating room equipment.
It's a really important problem, and I don't think there's an easy solution.
12:40 p.m.
Bloc
Jean-Denis Garon Bloc Mirabel, QC
I would like to go back to something Mr. Munter raised earlier.
At your hospital, Dr. Drake, to what extent do you rely on philanthropy to purchase the most important technology for children's health care?
12:40 p.m.
Chief of Surgery, Hospital for Sick Children
Yes, we rely quite heavily on philanthropy and, fortunately, Canadians are amazing in the way they step up and see that children's health care is extremely important. They seem very willing to help support us, but we still struggle to stay abreast, particularly for the very expensive pieces of technology such as an MRI scanner.
12:40 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Sean Casey
Thank you, Dr. Drake.
Mr. Davies, you have two and a half minutes, please.
12:40 p.m.
NDP
Don Davies NDP Vancouver Kingsway, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
To any of the children's hospital administrators, if you know, what is the hospital bed capacity and occupancy of children's hospitals in Canada? Does anybody know?
12:40 p.m.
President, McMaster Children's Hospital, and Chair of the Board of Directors, Children's Healthcare Canada
I'll take that question.
We don't currently have a system that allows us, on a real-time basis, to track occupancy or even bed capacity across Canada, so again, the short answer is, right now, no. We cannot tell you exactly what that occupancy is, but I can tell you, as I talk to my colleagues across the country, what they are saying—and you heard it earlier from Mr. Munter—is what we're seeing this September is far in excess of what we've ever experienced. We always have a little bit of a bump in emergency department visits and in-patient occupancy at this time of year as we return to school, but this year the pressures are unprecedented.
We speculate that is related to a more significant viral surge, and we have some evidence that's what was experienced in the southern hemisphere, particularly as it relates to influenza and RSV, not actually COVID. Really, the key point is, in the current context, including with the HR challenges you've heard about, children's hospitals across the board are struggling to handle that increased demand.
