A snapshot of hospital emergency room wait times across Canada

HEALTH

A snapshot of wait times at hospital emergency departments across Canada

Jesse Tahirali CTVNews.ca Interactives Editor

Published Tuesday, September 5, 2023 12:35PM EDT Last Updated Tuesday, September 5, 2023 12:36PM EDT

Text:

Reports of high average wait times at hospital emergency rooms across the country were punctuated by 麻豆影视 medical correspondent Avis Favaro's latest story focusing on the dire consequences long wait times at crowded ERs can have on patients.

In light of studies showing patients admitted to ERs are to get into an acute care bed, CTVNews.ca has collected wait time data over a recent time period from a selection of hospitals in cities across Canada, to give you a snapshot of the wait times Canadians are dealing with.

Note: certain provinces that are not currently providing wait time data for their hospital ERs are not included.

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British Columbia

The province has live data updated every five minutes for many of its hospitals. Its website lists estimated wait times and expected lengths of stay.

Below is a sample of wait times recorded over the past week at a selection of hospitals.

Alberta

Alberta has data updated every two minutes for emergency rooms and urgent care in Calgary, Edmonton, Grande Prairie, Lethbridge, Medicine Hat and Red Deer.

Below is a sample of recent emergency wait times.

Saskatchewan

Saskatchewan has a updated every 15 minutes, though the service has been temporarily unavailable.

Manitoba

Live emergency department wait times are available for four hospitals in Winnipeg.

Ontario

Ontario offers past monthly data of average wait times at more than 100 hospitals. The chart below depicts daily average times in the waiting room for the whole province and select hospitals for the month of June 2023.

Quebec

Quebec has data for 115 facilities that includes the current estimated waiting time for non-priority cases to see a doctor and the number of people waiting to see a doctor in the emergency room.

The chart below depicts daily average times in the waiting room for the whole province and select hospitals.

New Brunswick

New Brunswick has a , though the system is currently not operating. The site has the following message:

鈥淭he estimated Emergency Department (ED) wait times for Horizon鈥檚 hospitals are currently unavailable to allow us to complete maintenance to make the estimated wait time information as accurate as possible. We hope to share the estimated ED wait times again by late summer.鈥�

Nova Scotia

Nova Scotia offers live wait times and wait time forecasts for 10 hospitals. Estimates are given in the form of a range of hours (e.g. 3:00 - 4:45). Markers on the chart below are the center of each range recorded.