Deliveries at Notre-Dame hospital | Surgeons fear the impact on the operating room

The imminent opening of a birthing unit at Notre-Dame hospital in Montreal threatens the stability of the operating room which is already operating at only 66% of its capacity due to lack of staff, fear the surgeons of the establishment.

“What is shocking is that we are already short of staff while we are in the middle of a catch-up period in surgery. And there, we are going to add cesarean sections. We will also have to train staff, which will force us to close operating rooms in the coming weeks,” says Dr.^r Hugo Centomo, head of the surgery department of the CIUSSS Centre-Sud-de-l’Île-de-Montréal, to which Notre-Dame hospital reports.

Speaking on behalf of his team, D^r Centomo mentions that from the end of August to the beginning of September, seven operating rooms had to be shut down on certain days “due to lack of staff”. Currently, 4,071 patients are waiting for surgery at Notre-Dame hospital, including 1,180 for more than six months, he said. In addition, 111 patients are considered “out of time”.

A “gradual” opening

At the CIUSSS Centre-Sud-de-l’Île-de-Montréal, we assure that the opening plan for the Family Birth Unit (UFN) will be “gradual and progressive” and will serve “to monitor and evaluate the pressure” on teams in order to “not weaken other sectors of activity”. Already, 34 people have been recruited to work at the UFN, of which only three come from internally, indicates the spokesperson, Marianne Paquette.

In addition, women who give birth at Notre-Dame hospital will have “low-risk” pregnancies, which will limit the use of operating theaters and the pressure on the teams in place,” she indicates.

The UFN project at Notre-Dame hospital has been in preparation since 2017. Construction of the new $24 million unit was significantly slowed down by the pandemic. Its opening is now announced for November 27.

Concerns since the summer

Already at the beginning of July, around thirty surgeons and anesthetists from Notre-Dame hospital wrote to the health authorities of the CIUSSS Centre-Sud-de-l’Île-de-Montréal to express their concerns about the UFN project. They mentioned that since the opening of Notre-Dame hospital, demerged from the University of Montreal Hospital Center (CHUM) in 2017, the establishment “does not allow surgeons to exercise their specialty at full capacity “.

The doctors wrote that human resources in the operating room at Notre-Dame hospital were already in a “precarious and tense” climate. For them, the opening of the UFN would “potentially lead to a closure of operating rooms” for general customers.

“We think it is preferable to increase the efficiency of the operating room, treat surgical users as much as possible, and when everything is ready, put everything in motion for the opening of the UFN,” they wrote.

Despite these concerns expressed by doctors for months, the “train is moving forward”, notes the D^r Centomo. “The idea of ​​a birthing unit is not bad. But the time when we want to open it is not optimal,” he says.

For the D^r Centomo, the opening of the UFN should be postponed. Especially since the current needs in terms of delivery rooms in Montreal have been met, according to him. “Why is there such a rush to open a new birthing unit? ” he asks.