EDMONTON, AB: Despite the NDP promising better results in health care after throwing more money into a broken system, wait times for MRIs have skyrocketed by a shocking 11 weeks in just one year, the Wildrose Official Opposition said.
For 90 per cent of patients, wait times have increased from 24 weeks in June 2015 to 35 weeks, over a full eight months. At 245 days, MRIs for wait times in Alberta would be the longest in the country.
Instead of investigating ways to improve outcomes for patients, AHS officials are now looking for ways to ration MRI procedures throughout the province. Last year, Health Minister Sarah Hoffman announced over $500 million in new spending promising better results for Albertans.
“Under the NDP government, our health care system is more about dollars spent instead of actual patients served,” Wildrose Shadow Health Minister Drew Barnes said. “The NDP has not only failed to put together any real wait time reduction strategy, but things are actually getting worse.”
Wildrose believes in strengthening Alberta’s universal public health care system through developing an aggressive wait times reduction strategy, focusing funding on patient care, reducing wasteful spending, decentralizing decision making and improving choice for patients.
“The NDP government is continuing down the same broken model for health care as the previous government.” Barnes said. “With over $20 billion in spending, Alberta should be a leader in outcomes for patients across Canada, instead Albertans are just seeing wait times get longer.”