The mayors of Beiseker and Crossfield said they welcomed the news Alberta Health Services (AHS) conducted a survey of area residents about the state of health care in the community.
From Nov. 5 to Nov. 21, Rocky View County residents were asked to go online and complete the survey. The feedback of more than 350 residents was collected, according to Lisa Sutherland, spokesperson for AHS.
Airdrie and area is currently without 24-hour emergency health care because the Airdrie Regional Health Centre that provides urgent care is only open from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily. As a result, residents must rely on facilities in Calgary or Didsbury for after-hours care.
The absence of 24-hour emergency health care in Airdrie impacts more than just residents of Airdrie; Beiseker Mayor Ray Courtman said residents of his village also feel the strain of having limited access to health care.
“Right now it’s kind of a hodge-podge of care (in Beiseker)”, he said.
“When there is an emergency here in the village we do have a first responder medical team of volunteers and then an ambulance is called. That ambulance could end up taking the patient to Three Hills, possibly Drumheller and ultimately to Red Deer and then be transferred back into the city of Calgary. We have people going all over the countryside out here.”
“We have one family doctor who comes out twice a week,” Courtman said. “So we can be ill on Tuesdays and Thursdays.”
Courtman said he thinks the survey is “way overdue. “
“All these preliminary discussions and studies and surveys should have been done many years back,” he said. “They say that they couldn’t have predicted the huge population growth in Airdrie but obviously the population growth is there and they need to streamline the process and get this new health facility started. We need the building.”
Crossfield Mayor Nathan Anderson said where residents of the town go to access urgent care often depends on the severity of the health issue.
“There’s a lot of things that (the hospital in) Didsbury is good at, and there’s a lot of things they’ll defer to the larger centres in Calgary,” Anderson said.
“For a lot of the serious items, our citizens are going down to Calgary.”
“The other thing is Airdrie is a lot closer to us than Didsbury,” he said. “Didsbury is a good 25 minutes (away), whereas Airdrie is only 10 minutes so it’s substantially closer.”
Anderson said he’s attended a number of the meetings and events put on by the Airdrie Health Foundation – a group made up of local politicians including Airdrie Mayor Peter Brown, MLA for Airdrie Rob Anderson, as well as local physicians and concerned citizens.
“I personally am very supportive of this initiative (to improve urgent care in Airdrie) and have said as much to Mayor Brown, to MLA Rob Anderson and others,” he said.
“I’ve said, ‘if there’s anything we can do, letters of support or help, let us know.’ We certainly see the value for our citizens. It would certainly be helpful for them.”
What residents didn’t find in the survey is a question about building a hospital in Airdrie, according to Brown.
“What the experts in our community say we need is a health centre,” Brown said.
“That’s where you can have a place to go if you’re too ill to go home, they can keep you overnight. It wouldn’t be a hospital per se. Just building a hospital out here is not the answer to our challenges.”
Instead, residents were asked if they would support building a health centre that includes two “hubs,” one for 24-hour urgent care and the other focused on community health, including mental health services, social services and seniors’ health.
Julie Kerr, senior operating officer for Community and Rural Mental Health in the Calgary Zone with AHS said the survey was done in order to address the issues that come with Airdrie’s population growth.
“We know that we’ve got work to do in terms of making sure that our services meet the needs of the community both now and into the future,” Kerr said.
According to Kerr, the survey was intended to collect information and feedback from residents in the Airdrie area who may rely on the city’s healthcare system. The results will be an important tool for AHS, she said.
“We’ll look at any themes that emerge (from the survey results) and see if we got it right. Does this fit with people’s understanding of what the needs are of people in the community and what they’d like to see in terms of health in Airdrie and the surrounding area? And are there things we haven’t considered in the proposed approach that people think we need to pay attention to?” she said.
A timeline for when Rocky View residents might see improvements to Airdrie’s healthcare services can’t be set at this time, according to Kerr.
“I think the planning will be ongoing,” she said.
“We already have things that are underway to try to use existing infrastructure and existing services. Then there may be larger projects that may involve capital planning that I couldn’t give you timelines on because that’s a larger process that usually involves people outside of our zone planning.”
However, for his part, Brown said he’s optimistic change is coming for the residents of Airdrie and area.
“We’re very hopeful now that we’ll have something pulled together before the beginning of 2015,” Brown said.
“It’s a very exciting time as it relates to health care and securing some of the things a growing community like Airdrie needs to properly service the health needs of a city of our size.”
