The private cost of health-care queues in Canada
It’s no secret that Canadians face some of the longest health-care wait times in the developed world. According to the Fraser Institute’s annual survey of physicians, at 21.2 weeks from referral to treatment, Canadians waited longer in 2017 than ever before.
And for some patients, wait times can have serious consequences.
While this may be obvious for patients in need of critical care, it’s also true for Canadians waiting for medically necessary elective care such as hip replacements, hernia repair, cataract removal, aneurysm surgery and non-emergency pacemaker operations, for example.
It’s estimated that more than one in 10 patients are adversely affected by waiting for non-emergency surgery. Physicians indicate that patients wait longer than what’s considered clinically reasonable. And, of course, of the more than one million Canadians who waited for care in 2017, many would likely prefer to receive treatment earlier if possible.