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By Nathan Jordan

BC EHS

Staff Shortage Leads to 50 Minute Wait for Ambulance at Spruce Kings Home Game

Oct 3, 2022 | 6:12 PM

PRINCE GEORGE – The game had just entered the final 3 minutes of play, when Vernon Vipers defenseman Will Blackburn took a nasty face-first hit into the boards. With the injured Blackburn being attended to by rink first aid attendants, and both hockey team’s physicians, 911 was immediatly called, the score clock time was allowed to run out… but half an hour later ,and with no sign of an ambulance, Ron Gallo decided to take matters into his own hands.

“We’ve seen players get injured, sometimes they’re clean hits, sometimes they’re dirty hits, sometimes people are left you know, stretchered off, neck brace, the whole nine yards… But what I’ve never seen before, is an ambulance take that long” -Ron Gallo

Gallo says, while he’d never condone his actions to someone else, after 30 minutes of waiting, and seeing the growing distress in the crowd, he took it on himself to visit the local emergency room and track down Emergency Health Services himself

“The ambulance station is just at the top of the hill, so I actually got in my truck and decided to go for a drive. There was no activity around the ambulance depot so I drove around to the Emergency side of the Hospital, there was an ambulance there and one ambulance attendant in the driver seat, so I parked my vehicle and went and had a conversation with her, asked if she knew what was happening down at the rink” -Ron Gallo

These types of delays are all too common these day due to staff shortages, says Troy Clifford, President of the BC Ambulance Paramedic’s Union.

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“Really we just dont have enough ambulances that are staffed on a daily basis. We’re seeing upwards of 30% of ambulances in the Prince George and surrounding areas that are not staffed fully. A lot of communities in the outlying areas that only have 2 ambulances, are down to only 1. What that means is we dont have staff to physically staff the ambulances… largely because of our inability to recruit and retain staff” – Troy Clifford

Unacceptable as these delays may be, Clifford says, until more staff is hired and a solution is found to retain them, these types of delays and backlogs will keep happening.