CONTENTS
Standing Committee on Human Services
THIRTIETH
LEGISLATURE
of
the
Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan
STANDING
COMMITTEE ON
Hansard Verbatim Report
No.
3 — Tuesday, April 1, 2025
[The
committee met at 16:59.]
Chair Weger:
— Welcome to the Standing Committee on Human Services. My name is Mike Weger; I
am the Chair. To my left I have Mr. Noor Burki, Ms. Vicki Mowat, and Ms. Kim
Breckner. And on my right I have Mr. Barret Kropf, Mr. Kim Gartner, and Ms.
Colleen Young. Thank you all for being here this afternoon.
Today the committee will be considering
the estimates and supplementary estimates no. 2 for the Ministry of
Health. We will take a half-hour recess at 7 p.m.
General Revenue Fund
Health
Vote 32
Subvote (HE01)
Chair Weger:
— We will now begin with consideration of vote 32, Health, central management
and services, subvote (HE01). Minister Cockrill and Minister Carr are here with
officials from the ministry. I would ask that officials please state their
names before speaking and please don’t touch the microphones. The Hansard
operator will turn your microphone on when you are speaking to the committee.
Minister, please introduce your
officials and make your opening remarks.
Hon. Jeremy Cockrill: — Thank you, Mr.
Chair and members of the committee, for spending another evening with us here
reviewing the estimates of the Ministry of Health. Before I get into my
comments, I’ll just go through my officials. And again, I was noting last night
to many of them that it’s kind of unique to have all the combination of these
specific officials in one room at the same time. So appreciate everybody taking
time out of their schedules to be here and assist with these estimates.
Sitting to my left, deputy minister
Tracey Smith. To her left is Minister Carr, of course. Also joining us, Norman
O’Neill, assistant deputy minister; Chad Ryan, assistant deputy minister; James
Turner, assistant deputy minister; Ingrid Kirby, assistant deputy minister;
David Matear, assistant deputy minister; Heather Murray, executive director,
continuing care branch; Erin Jennings, acting executive director, drug plan and
extended benefits branch; Jamie Ash, executive director, mental health and
addictions branch; Jillian Code, the executive director, population health
branch; Tami Denomie, executive director of partnerships, privacy and
legislative services branch; Monica Field, executive director, health
informatics branch; Melissa Kimens, executive director, primary care branch;
Dave Morhart, executive director, acute and emergency services branch; Deborah
Moynes-Keshen, executive director, health human resources branch; Kim Statler,
executive director, medical services branch; Joy Vanstone, executive director,
financial services branch; Jeff Marshall, director of finance with the Ministry
of Health; Sheldon Brandt, executive director, strategy and innovation branch;
Morgan Bradshaw, executive director, strategic operations; Stacey Rennebohm,
executive advisor to the deputy minister.
Also joining us, Terri Strunk, CEO
[chief executive officer] of the Saskatchewan Healthcare Recruitment Agency;
Andrew Will, CEO of the Saskatchewan Health Authority. And also joining us from
the Saskatchewan Health Authority, we have Brenda Schwan, the vice-president of
integrated rural health, and Mike Northcott, the chief human resources officer.
We also have Deb Bulych, the CEO of the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency, and Mark
Anderson, CEO of 3sHealth [Health Shared Services Saskatchewan].
So I appreciate the opportunity to talk
about the health budget for the 2025‑2026 fiscal year. As you heard from
the Minister of Finance recently, the theme of this year’s provincial budget is
Delivering for You. Whether it’s about affordability, education, or
health care, this budget reflects the priorities and delivers on what
Saskatchewan residents told us is most important to them.
Now for health care the focus is on
delivering better access and improved care to Saskatchewan patients and their
families. The Ministry of Health and the health partner agencies play a crucial
role in fulfilling this mandate. I want to extend my appreciation for their
commitment to our shared goal of delivering high-quality, patient-centred care
to the people of this great province. Working in partnership, we are dedicated
to achieving a responsive and integrated health system that puts the patient
first.
Most importantly though, I want to thank
the physicians, the nurses, and all of our front-line health care providers
across the province for the work that they do every day to improve and save
lives of our family and friends. I’d like to assure them directly that our
government is fully behind them, and we are working hard to alleviate the
pressures they are currently facing across the system.
Now investments in this year’s budget
demonstrate our government’s commitment to improving lives through a strong and
responsive health care system. A record investment in health care in 2025‑2026
of nearly $8.1 billion, which is an increase of $485 million, or 6.4
per cent over last year’s budget.
This investment will deliver on key
commitments, including better and more timely access to acute and emergency
care; team-based primary care and continuing care services; progress on the
mental health and addictions action planning; accelerating health care
workforce hiring; and infrastructure projects, including new hospitals,
long-term care homes, and additional urgent care centres. And I’ll go through
that list a little bit later on in my remarks.
We’re also making significant
investments in our health partner agencies to support them in delivering the
important care that Saskatchewan patients need. The Saskatchewan Health
Authority’s operating budget will receive a $261.1 million increase, or
5.6 per cent, for a record $4.94 billion total budget.
The Saskatchewan Cancer Agency’s total
budget will increase by 30.4 million, or 12.2 per cent, for a total record
investment of $279.3 million to ensure that Saskatchewan patients have
access to the most current and effective oncology drugs, therapies, and cancer
treatment options.
eHealth Saskatchewan will receive an
increase of $9.3 million, or 6.1 per cent, for a total record budget of
$161.2 million to support both health care providers and patients.
Now this budget includes an
$88.1 million total increase to provide better patient access to acute
care and emergency services and safer, more responsive patient care.
Now before I provide more details of
this year’s investment in this area, I’d like to take a moment to reflect on
some of the accomplishments over the last year, as they help to set up some of
the investments made in this year’s budget. We have expanded capacity in
Saskatoon by adding more acute care, ICU [intensive care unit], and emergency
department beds. And as part of a multi-year strategy, we are working towards
expanding ICU capacity across the province to a total of 110 beds.
For emergency medical services, 56 new
full-time equivalent paramedic positions have been added this past year, for a total
of 270 new full-time equivalent paramedic positions since 2020‑2021
budget.
In
Regina the urgent care centre opened in July and has seen more than 30,000
patients as of this morning, providing greater access to urgent care. And in
Saskatoon construction of an urgent care centre is under way in partnership
with Ahtahkakoop Cree Developments. We are also on track to open the breast
health centre here in Regina in just a few days.
So now moving to this year’s budget,
2025‑2026, a $30 million increase is provided to realign services at
Saskatoon City Hospital with a multi-year plan that will add more than 100
acute care beds to further mitigate capacity pressures in Saskatoon. This is in
addition to the $15 million we recently invested to begin this work and
accelerate capital renovations, equipment upgrades, and operations to expand
those acute care services at City Hospital.
I can’t understate how important this
investment is to the city of Saskatoon. Not too long ago Andrew Will, CEO of
the Saskatchewan Health Authority, talked about how this is essentially adding
another hospital facility to the city of Saskatoon, so very important.
Efforts are ongoing to ensure
Saskatchewan hospitals have the resources they need to provide high-quality
care to every patient. The investments we make today will have a lasting impact
on the provincial health care system.
We also have plans in this year’s budget
to ramp up surgical volumes this year through a $15.1 million investment
increase. And this will kick-start ambitious plans to perform 450,000
procedures over the next four years and reduce surgical wait times for
patients. Funding in this year’s budget will support a minimum of 100,000
surgeries in this province. The objective is that by the end of the year, no
patient will have to wait longer than 12 months for surgery, and 90 per cent of
surgeries will be offered to patients within six months.
To support this effort, this year’s
budget also includes an expansion of the robot-assisted surgical program at
Pasqua Hospital, clinical pathway enhancements, and full implementation of the
O.R. [operating room] manager system across the province.
Pediatric programs will receive a
$7.6 million increase this year to build further capacity to care for our
young patients in Saskatchewan. Pediatric programs are so important, and they
provide complex, comprehensive care to children. This additional funding will
ensure specialists and program staff are in place to serve an increasing number
of young patients requiring specialty care. This investment will support two
pediatric endocrinologists, a pediatric palliative care specialist, a pediatric
respirologist, and a pediatric rheumatologist.
It will also add multidisciplinary staff
and physicians from pediatric programs within the Jim Pattison Children’s
Hospital, including pediatric gastroenterology, allergy, immunology, and
pediatric cardiology, as well as program funding for specialized neonatologists
within the Prince Albert neonatal intensive care unit.
Emergency medical services across the
province will benefit from a further investment of $6.6 million in this
year’s budget in an effort to support multi-year stabilization initiatives.
This investment will add one new 24‑7 ambulance in Regina to improve
response times in the city and surrounding communities. It also provides
funding to support approximately 65 rural and remote paramedic positions
previously added through the rural EMS [emergency medical services] stabilization
initiative.
An increase of $6 million will
provide additional capacity for CT [computerized tomography], MRI [magnetic
resonance imaging], and PET/CT [positron emission tomography/computerized
tomography] scans to increase access to these specialized medical imaging
services and reduce wait-lists for patients. More than 10,000 additional
procedures will be performed, supporting our goal of achieving a 60‑day
wait time by the year 2027‑2028.
Now this year’s budget also includes a
$3.1 million increase in capital funding to replace or retrofit medical
imaging equipment including the replacement of an MRI and CT scanner at Regina
General Hospital, replacement of a CT scanner and retrofit of an MRI at Royal
University Hospital in Saskatoon, and replacement of medical imaging equipment
in various rural health facilities across the province.
A $4.3 million increase will boost
kidney dialysis capacity in the province by adding nearly 30 full-time
positions in Regina and Saskatoon as well as Moose Jaw, Fort Qu’Appelle,
Tisdale, North Battleford, and Meadow Lake. This investment means more kidney
patients will receive timely, safe care as close to home as possible. Bringing
services closer to patients’ home community allows them to remain close to
their families and improves their health outcomes and their quality of life.
The Saskatchewan Health Authority will
receive increased funding of $1.1 million this year to support additional
minimally invasive cardiology procedures and additional respiratory therapists
for Saskatchewan’s hyperbaric oxygen therapy service located in Moose Jaw.
In the areas of testing and laboratory
medicine, a $2 million increase, along with $4.5 million in new
funding for capital equipment, will support additional pathology staff in
Regina as well as additional lab staff and operational costs for rural and
remote labs to mitigate emergency department disruptions.
Increased annual funding at
$1.7 million will support 14 full-time positions at the provincial
genetics and metabolic program located at the Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital
in Saskatoon. This program provides medical diagnoses, care planning, and treatment
pathways for patients with complex medical diagnoses.
Now in terms of facility operating
funding, this year’s budget includes a $1.9 million increase to complete
and fully staff the new breast health centre in Regina. We look forward to our
grand opening of that facility in earlier . . . later on this month,
I should say. Also another $1.9 million will support operational costs for
the Regina Urgent Care Centre, which again, as I mentioned earlier, has seen
great success so far.
It’s important that patients and staff
feel safe when they go to the hospital, and a $2.5 million increase for
more protective services and increased security presence at provincial
hospitals and acute care sites will improve that safety for patients, visitors,
staff, and physicians.
Also a $545,000 investment is provided
for the expansion of the COPS [community oncology program of Saskatchewan]
program, otherwise known as the community oncology program, that will ensure
more cancer patients will be able to receive treatment close to home.
Now this budget will also deliver better
access to team-based primary and preventative care to meet the health care
needs of Saskatchewan people, with a $42.4 million increased investment.
This includes investments in programs that will work towards the goal of
connecting all residents to a primary care provider. This is a commitment that
we made in the last fall’s Throne Speech, and one we intend to deliver on.
Now among the successes we’ve seen in
primary care I would like to mention the Saskatchewan Health Authority’s nurse
practitioner-led clinics in Warman and Martensville, as well as the pharmacy
care pilot project in Swift Current. The pharmacy pilot is offering a variety
of medication management services for chronic disease and mental health, which
is significantly increasing access to care for people living in Swift Current
and the surrounding area.
[17:15]
In addition, expanding the scope of
practice for pharmacists to include strep throat and ear infection testing and
treatment has shown very positive early results. With nearly 50 sites across
the province, this pilot project has already provided care to nearly 1,400
patients since January, improving access and offering more services that we
expect closer to where we live.
In the area of preventative care a
$3.9 million increase will support the transition to HPV [human papilloma
virus] self-screening for cervical cancer, progress on a provincial lung cancer
screening program, lower breast cancer screening eligibility to age 43 by March
of 2026, and support a second mobile mammography bus to increase access for
women in rural and northern Saskatchewan.
We will continue efforts to reduce
sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections by investing $1.1 million
in additional staffing at the Saskatchewan Health Authority, and supports for
expansion of the prenatal outreach resource team, or PORT. This team is located
in Saskatoon and the Northwest.
In addition a $7.1 million increase
will support our provincial immunization programming, and this includes a
$4 million utilization increase to support the delivery of the provincial
immunization programs as well as enhance coverage for the HPV immunization for
young males, the shingles vaccine for adult transplant recipients, and a
single-dose RSV [respiratory syncytial virus] antibody for high-risk infants.
The 2025‑2026 budget also delivers
on our government’s commitment to expand glucose monitoring coverage through a
$23 million incremental investment. This change has come into effect
today, April 1st, and will provide a 100 per cent coverage of continuous and
flash glucose monitoring systems to young adults up to the age of 25 and
seniors age 65 and over. This expanded coverage will benefit nearly 10,000
Saskatchewan residents, leading to a better quality of life and reduced
financial impact to those families.
2025‑2026 budget also delivers on
our government’s commitment to provide a fertility treatment tax credit to make
it more affordable for individuals and couples in our province to access
fertility treatments and grow their family. A $3 million investment will
provide a 50 per cent refundable tax credit for the 2025 tax year for the cost
of one round of IVF [in vitro fertilization] fertility treatment to a maximum
of $20,000 of eligible expenses.
All of these initiatives to deliver
improved patient care to residents in communities right across the province are
supported by our province’s health human resources action plan, the most
ambitious plan in our nation. I am pleased to see steady progress being made on
multiple initiatives to recruit, train, incentivize, and retain more health
professionals and strengthen health care teams. Since the launch of the HHR
[health human resources] action plan in September of 2022, Saskatchewan has
seen impressive recruitment results, with 488 physicians establishing practice
in the province, which includes 38 from outside of Canada. These efforts
resulted in 243 family physicians and 245 specialists establishing their
practices here in Saskatchewan.
Now to support the province’s efforts to
recruit and retain doctors, this year’s budget includes an additional
$94.6 million increase for physician services. This includes funding for
negotiated fee increases with the Saskatchewan Medical Association, increased
utilization of services, and additional physicians.
We’ve also seen great success in hiring
nurses and health professionals from abroad. Nearly 1,880 nursing graduates
from in and out of province were hired between April 2023 and December 2024,
and more than 400 internationally educated health care professionals from the
Philippines are working in communities right across our province. And we have
delivered on our commitment to fill 250 new full-time positions at the SHA
[Saskatchewan Health Authority] in rural and remote communities.
A range of attractive incentive programs
are available to students and recent graduates. And since the launch of our HHR
action plan, the province has disbursed over 600 final clinical placement
bursaries, nearly 150 paramedic bursaries and other scholarships and grants to
encourage students to pursue a career in health care.
In addition many graduates are eligible
for the graduate retention tax credits and the student loan forgiveness
programs. Now continued investment into our ambitious HHR action plan ensures
Saskatchewan remains an attractive place for health care professionals to live,
work, and build their career.
This budget continues building on the
success of the HHR action plan with a total budget of $88.6 million for
health to accelerate hiring and growth of the health care workforce. This
includes previously committed funding of $10.7 million to support ongoing
work on established recruitment initiatives such as the Saskatchewan
international physician practice assessment program, or SIPPA, and recruitment
of internationally educated health care workers.
These funds will also advance hiring of
physician assistants and clinical assistants and support the Saskatchewan
Healthcare Recruitment Agency. A total of $17.1 million, which is an
increase of $7.4 million in this year’s budget, will enable the University
of Saskatchewan’s College of Medicine to expand family medicine and specialty
residency seats, recruit additional academic physicians, expand enhanced skills
programs to regional sites, and support their operations.
An additional 10 residency seats will be
added for family medicine, anesthesia, plastic surgery, and other specialties.
And this brings our total number of seats in the province of Saskatchewan to
150 residency seats in our province.
The province continues to fund eight
undergraduate medical education seats that were part of previous expansions
over the last two years, and now we have a total of 108 undergraduate seats
every year at the College of Medicine.
Now this budget also supports the
advanced training of 20 pharmacists through the University of Saskatchewan’s
continuing pharmacy education program to provide chronic disease management for
approved conditions.
This year’s health budget provides a
total of $13 million for a range of attractive incentive programs such as
the rural and remote recruitment incentive, rural physician incentive program,
and other incentives for specialists. This includes new funding of
$1 million to support recruitment of specialist physicians in high demand
for areas experiencing shortages, such as anesthesia, psychiatry, breast and
interventional radiology, emergency medicine, and targeted pediatric
subspecialties.
Now retention of health care staff has
been a key area of focus, particularly in rural and remote communities. And to
support those efforts the 2025‑2026 health budget provides a total
investment of $44.7 million for retention initiatives, $600,000 of which
is through Advanced Education’s budget.
Now, Mr. Chair, I’ll move on to
infrastructure. And this year’s infrastructure budget will advance progress on
key projects with another record level investment of $656.9 million, which
is $140.1 million higher than last year. Now this includes
$322.4 million for Prince Albert Victoria Hospital to construct a new
multi-level acute care tower; $40 million for Regina long-term care
specialized bed construction; $33.8 million for the construction of the La
Ronge long-term care facility; $24.4 million to finish the construction at
Weyburn General Hospital; $10 million for the Grenfell long-term care
project construction; $6 million for new complex-needs emergency shelters;
$3 million for the development of Saskatoon’s urgent care centre, again in
partnership with Ahtahkakoop Cree Developments; and $1 million to support
planning of five new urgent care centres in Saskatoon, Regina, Prince Albert,
Moose Jaw, and North Battleford.
This year’s funding will also support
ongoing projects under planning, including the Yorkton Regional Health Centre,
the Rosthern Hospital, the ICU expansion at Royal University Hospital, the
Saskatchewan Cancer Agency’s Saskatoon patient lodge, the Esterhazy integrated
care facility, and long-term care projects in several communities, including
Regina, The Battlefords, Watson, and Estevan.
Our government continues to make strong
investments in infrastructure, technology, and innovation to support better
patient care. Since November 2007, we have invested $3.7 billion into
facilities and equipment to meet the needs of a growing province.
In closing, I want to thank the
committee for the opportunity to outline really the significant investments
being made by the Ministry of Health in this year’s 2025‑2026 budget. I
look forward to continuing serving in my capacity as Minister of Health
alongside my colleague Minister Carr. I look forward to working with the
ministry and our health system partners to continue delivering high-quality
care for Saskatchewan people. My officials and I will now be pleased to answer
any questions. Thank you.
Chair Weger:
— Thank you, Minister. I will now open the floor to questions. We’ll start with
Ms. Mowat.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you, Mr.
Chair. Minister, officials, other committee members, thanks for being here this
evening. I want to thank the minister for his opening remarks and also take
some time to acknowledge the front-line workers who do so much throughout this
vast system of health as well. And that is, after all, why we’re all here. So
thank you for that.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So you know, I’ll make a couple comments. You know, number one, today’s April
1st, so the fiscal year just ended yesterday. And what’s published in the
budget documents is a forecast. So again that number, as you well know, will
likely see some fluctuation.
You know, I’ll say there are several
things included in that last year forecast update that won’t repeat, for
example, into this year. So you know, I think about the $10 million
investment made into Ronald McDonald House Charities of Saskatchewan. That’s a
one-time expense to support the construction of a 20-room facility in Regina
and a 12-room facility in Prince Albert. And really, I mean, that in itself is
a very significant investment to support the children and families in this
province, both in southern Saskatchewan but then also in the North as well.
You know, in terms of other things that
won’t be repeated, you know, there’s also retroactive pay based on settlements
that were made in the Ministry of Health. So again that’s an expense that won’t
be repeated in this year’s budget.
[17:30]
We also saw some utilization pressures
in last year . . . and you know, and again, specific utilization
pressures that are above our three-year average in those categories and
utilization that we expect to see lower in this year. I’ll mention two of
those.
Number one, our out-of-province category
in terms of needing to send patients out of province for different procedures.
Obviously again, once we start getting more stabilization in several specific
services around the province, we’re expecting that we would come back to a more
reasonable number on that line item. The other utilization pressure that was
higher than our three-year average was in our work with the Canadian Blood
Services. And again, we expect that volume to normalize.
I’d also point to, you know — and Mike
Northcott from the Saskatchewan Health Authority spoke to it yesterday — but
the reduction in the use of contract nurses. You know, obviously in the
2024-2025 year, we expect to see a 30 per cent reduction. We expect to see
another 30 per cent reduction in this year’s budget. And again, as we see more
people taking full-time positions, taking advantage of the many incentives
available to them, as I outlined in my opening comments, again it’s our goal to
reduce the reliance on contract nurses, you know, specifically in some of the
more challenged departments around the province.
So again, you know, that just goes to
show that some things are dropping off in the ’24-25 budget. But again, and,
Ms. Mowat, I would even point to your colleague who was here last night asking
questions who herself said that, you know, the health care spending in this
year’s budget is going up. It’s a 6.4 per cent increase over last year’s
budget. Obviously throughout the year different expenses come up. You have to
make good on that, because we’re delivering patient care to the people of this
province. But again we’re comfortable with the budgeted numbers that we have
heading into this fiscal year.
Vicki Mowat: — With regards to
the retroactive pay for settlements that the ministry doesn’t believe will be
repeated, considering the current climate of collective bargaining and the fact
that we have folks who have been without a contract for two, three years, why would
it be reasonable to expect that something like that wouldn’t happen again? Like
do we not expect that there would be some settlement in the collective
bargaining in this fiscal year that would have to be factored in? And if that
were the case, certainly it’s not budgeted at this point, right?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Yeah, I’ll just make a comment to that right away, you know, because I spoke
with . . . I’ve had the opportunity to speak with SGEU [Saskatchewan
Government and General Employees’ Union] and CUPE [Canadian Union of Public
Employees] members over the last couple of days who have had the exact same
question — if a settled contract or, you know, where we hope to get to within
the terms of a settled agreement is accounted for in the 2025-2026 budget,
obviously we don’t account for that until we have a settled contract. But I
want to be very clear with front-line health care workers in the province that
just because there isn’t maybe a specific line item for contract settlements in
the 2025-2026 budget, the direction still exists from the Ministry of Health
and myself and the Saskatchewan Health Authority to SAHO [Saskatchewan
Association of Health Organizations] to be working with our union partners to
get to settled contracts as soon as we can.
Vicki Mowat: — You also referred
to the out-of-province category being inflated last year. Can you speak to why
there’s an increase in the budget line item for out-of-province — I’m looking
at (HE06) — an increase of about 11.57 per cent for out-of-province, if that is
not expected to be a continued pressure in the upcoming year?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So thanks for the question. Appreciate the opportunity to clarify here. So what
you’re seeing in the (HE06), that’s a budget-to-budget number. So last year
budgeted $138.332 million; this year’s budget has $154.332 million.
However our 2024-2025 forecasted number of what we expect to actually spend in
this fiscal year that just ended yesterday is about $157 million. And
again, our three-year average on that has been about $150 million. So we
feel again, in this year’s budget, budgeting a reasonable amount, but obviously
we expect to see a bit of a decrease from last year.
And I should clarify as well. I think
it’s important to note that . . . and again, we have lots of
discussions in this House about, you know, specific procedures or specific
categories where people may need to be sent somewhere else to receive care,
where we might be having disruptions or we might not offer a procedure. Keep in
mind that this line item would also count, I mean, for folks that live close to
the Alberta or Manitoba borders that may go see a practitioner in a different
province; that visit then gets billed back to the Ministry of Health. Or if you
or I were in a car accident in a different province and needed to seek medical
attention, again the cost of that would be billed back to our province and
would fall under this out-of-province line in (HE06).
Vicki Mowat: — Can you clarify
something, Minister? You said the three-year average is 150 million. Do
you mean that over the past three years it has floated around 150 million,
that line item?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Correct. The three-year average — again that accounts for the 2024-2025
forecast, which again we haven’t seen the final number on — our three-year
average in that category is about $150.6 million.
Vicki Mowat: — Of those dollars,
what’s the breakdown between . . . like I certainly think some of the
more expensive items would be sending people out of province for knee and hip
surgeries as well as breast cancer care. Do you have the dollar figures of what
those have looked like last year versus this year? And where do you expect to
see savings in that portfolio?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Sorry, can you just for clarity’s sake, just so we can try and get as clear an
answer for you as . . . Are you asking specifically about breast
health and orthopedics, or are there other categories that you’re asking about
as well?
Vicki Mowat: — I guess those
categories and then anything else that amounts to something similar. I would
expect that those would be the largest categories, but I’m wondering if there’s
something else as well.
Hon. Jeremy Cockrill: — Okay, we’ll
endeavour to find something for you.
So again, just . . . I
appreciate the opportunity to provide clarity on the out-of-province line item
here. So really in this line item there’s really three categories. So there’s
the out-of-province hospital reciprocal bucket, which would be the largest
bucket out of this line item. And again I should say just off the top, you know,
again the numbers for 2024-2025 are not yet final. So again, as per answers
last night, those will likely be final sometime this summer.
[17:45]
But so three major buckets in the
out-of-province: hospital reciprocal, which is really . . . It’s
providing payment to other provinces for services provided in hospital to
Saskatchewan residents. That’s the largest bucket.
Then there’s the out-of-province
medical, which is payment for physician services to Saskatchewan residents. You
know, so an example of this would be funding for medical reciprocal agreements
with other provinces and territories, excluding Quebec, obviously. And again,
these physician rates are based on the rate negotiated with every province.
And then the smallest of the three major
buckets is out-of-province non-reciprocal. So you know, like again this would
include payments specific for, say, residents in the Creighton-Denare Beach
area that would be accessing services through Manitoba Health at the Flin Flon
General Hospital or at hospitals in the United States for insured services that
are approved prior to them . . . folks leaving the province.
I guess if you want more specific
information on kind of which services are being accessed out of province, I
would point you to the Ministry of Health’s medical services branch Annual
Statistical Report 2023‑2024, page 29, table 13b. And really that
outlines all the different, you know, services or in-patient and out-patient
treatments and which provinces those are occurring in.
Just on the breast and orthopedic side,
the money spent to make sure that Saskatchewan patients have access to those
services, albeit out of province, those line items are actually not in this
out-of-province. They would fall under our surgical line items.
Vicki Mowat: — Okay. In that
case, how many women have been sent out of province for breast health
diagnostics to date? And what was the price of those expenses?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Okay, so I’ll provide the most up-to-date numbers that I have access to. So as
of January 22nd, 2025 a total of 539 patients have been referred to the clinic
in Calgary. Of those 539, 472 patients have already had these procedures
completed in Calgary. So to date the Ministry of Health, you know, has spent
. . . Or to that date the Ministry of Health has been invoiced by
Clearpoint, Beam about $376,000 for the direct cost of the procedures, and then
obviously about another half million dollars for travel expenses for patients.
Now just to be clear on the math, to save you a question, Clearpoint, Beam
hasn’t invoiced us yet at that date for all the procedures completed.
So the cost of the procedure as per our
contract with Clearpoint in the 2024‑2025 fiscal year was $2,000 per
patient. You know, every woman that’s going is getting a biopsy and potentially
a diagnostic mammogram as well. I think it’s really important to note a couple
of things, and maybe I’ll just take issue with some of the kind of
back-and-forth on this issue over the last several weeks. It’s very important
to communicate and have Saskatchewan women know that the only reason that they
would be referred to Calgary is for a biopsy or a diagnostic mammogram. These
are not screening mammograms.
The screening program in Saskatchewan,
you know, is something that we continue to invest in so that the women of this
province have it available to them in the province. You see that as well in
this budget with the investment into a second mammography bus for screening
mammograms. I think we’re quite proud of the work that’s being done there and
the work on improving access to better screening, especially as we lowered the
age to that over the years.
The other thing I’ll just maybe point
out is, you know, there’s also been some comments made out there that this
agreement with Clearpoint being this 10 times the cost of what it would be to
do that in an SHA-run facility in the province. And I’ve got to say, that can’t
be further from the truth.
In fact, you know, our
back-of-the-napkin math for a basic biopsy which doesn’t include additional
imaging — which again, if needed for the women who go to Calgary is included in
the contract — we’re looking, you know, close to $1,200 per biopsy in terms of
an estimated cost at an SHA facility, not even including the cost of the
facility itself. So it’s $1,200 in province without even having a building. So
you know, the basic math there would show it’s . . . To say it’s 10
times the cost is not even close to reality. So I guess I just wanted to, along
with providing the number of patients, also provide some clarity on those two
points.
Vicki Mowat: — So 472 patients as
of January 22nd. That includes everything to date, and the cost is 2,000 per
patient?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Yes, the cost during the ’24‑2025 fiscal year was $2,000 a patient.
Vicki Mowat: — Okay. What is the
wait-list for screening mammograms in Regina?
[18:00]
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So a few comments on this question specifically. So when it comes to
mammography screening, as of February 25th, 2025 technically . . .
Try and clarify this for you. So technically Regina doesn’t have a wait-list
per se because as clients call in, the Cancer Agency is booking appointments
for them and basically filling up the calendar.
Now as of February 25th the Regina
location for Sask Cancer Agency was booking clients into early December of
2025. Now however oftentimes there are appointments within three weeks in other
regional sites, so say Yorkton or Prince Albert or North Battleford or
Saskatoon and so, you know, again working to offer that to people.
Now I will just note that the Cancer
Agency is currently moving the clients who are booked the furthest away
time-wise into Regina, trying to book them in to sooner appointments as they
come up, whether that be cancellations or what have you.
You know, I should note today just some
of the advances being made by the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency due to some
efficiencies that the Cancer Agency has been able to find over the last little
while. We’ve actually moved from 15‑minute appointments to 10‑minute
appointments, which obviously means that you can see more people. So that’s
positive in terms of making sure that we can get more women through.
You know, I should also note that
starting today actually, installation began of second mammography machines at
both the Saskatoon and Regina locations of the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency. So
again installation of the machines itself started today, so we won’t be able to
use those to do screening for, you know, a little bit of time here as we get
those machines set up. And I should just thank again, the Cancer Foundation of
Saskatchewan really deserves credit in terms of raising money for those
machines and so that we can get those into our facilities as quickly as
possible.
So anyway just wanted to clarify kind of
how the Regina process works, but then also speak to some of the efficiencies
found with SCA [Saskatchewan Cancer Agency] recently and how that means we’re
able to see more women.
Vicki Mowat: — So last year,
Minister, I was told on April 9th, 2024 — actually it wasn’t me; it was one of
my colleagues — was told that there were currently 6,400 patients in the queue
for mammography in Regina. Are you saying you don’t have that number now?
Hon. Jeremy Cockrill: — You know, we will
try and see if we have that number available for you. I’ll just note, one other number I
neglected to mention in my first response there was really just around the number
of mammograms performed in the province. We expect to see probably close to
34,000 mammograms completed across the province, which is about 10 per cent
increase from last year. Again I tried to just provide some clarity on how the
Regina process works, but we’ll endeavour to see if we have a number for you on
that.
All right. Thanks for the question on
that. So yeah, so that number that was shared April 9th . . . I think
it looks like Mr. Clarke was asking questions at that time. And so you know, at
that time the answer provided was approximately 6,400 women in the queue. So
again those are number of people that had been booked, had appointments booked
and just waiting for the appointment date to come. I’ll note that they were
booking into January at that time. So currently as of this evening, the most recent
number that we can pull is about 6,100 women in the Regina queue. And I should
just clarify though — let me be very clear — that the 6,100, these are women
who have an appointment booked. They know the date.
[18:15]
And as I mentioned in my previous answer
as well, you know, with the Saskatchewan Cancer Agency shortening up
appointment times, being able to see more women on a weekly and daily basis,
that’s helping us move more quickly through that queue. And then again as
cancellations or appointments need to be moved around, you know, if a woman
actually chooses to go to a regional site or access the mobile mammography bus
service, we’re taking those patients with the furthest appointments booked out
and bringing them forward as soon as we can in that regard.
Vicki Mowat: — I had a follow-up
question about the math on the women who have travelled out of province for
biopsies. So you said 472 had already had their procedures, and 539 have been
referred so they’re sort of pending. The cost is $2,000 per patient, so 472
times 2,000, we’re talking about 944,000. That’s over the span of, I think,
three years that this has been going on.
Can you also provide what that total
number is for the travel and accommodations expenses that have been reimbursed?
Because I know that that 944,000 will not include the travel and accommodations
expenses.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So let’s just go through the math again. So 539 — and again this is as of
January 22nd, 2025 — so 539 patients referred. As of that date, 472 patients
had actually gone and come back. And as of that date the Ministry of Health had
been invoiced $376,000 for the direct costs of those procedures.
Now again I’ll just clarify, as I said
earlier, the reason that the math isn’t totalling 472 times 2,000 is because we
at that time, January 22nd, we hadn’t received all the invoices from Clearpoint
and Beam. So I’ll just clarify that, that obviously it will be 2,000 times 472.
In terms of the travel expenses for
those 472 patients, the cost at that time was $540,000 of travel expense
reimbursement, and again those numbers started from November 30th, 2023 when
the Saskatchewan Health Authority began calling patients to offer the
opportunity for this service.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. At the Regina breast health
centre, what types of services are being
planned? Is there a metric for how many services you’re expecting? And what is
the plan for the number of FTEs [full-time equivalent] as well as the different
occupations that you’re planning to be operational?
Tracey Smith:
— Thank you. Thanks for the question. Tracey Smith, deputy minister of Health.
And before I turn it over to Ingrid, I thought I would just give a little bit
of context just around the breast health centre and some more specifics around
sort of the new positions that are being added to support this new health
centre.
So in terms of the breast health centre
in Regina that the minister had noted is going to be opening a little bit later
this month, really the intent there is to really co-locate the services such as
diagnostic imaging, consultation with specialists and surgeons, patient
education, support, and navigation into one centre to really make it as easy
and seamless as possible for women who are needing those services. The centre
will also offer on-site access to post-treatment care such as therapies and
rehabilitation. And again Ingrid can speak to that in a little bit more detail.
In terms of the new positions, we do
have a number of new positions that are new for this particular centre. There’s
8.8 new full-time positions at this centre, and that’s comprised of a nurse
navigator, a unit support worker, a manager, an office assistant, medical
radiation technologist specialist, a medical imaging scheduler, a diagnostic
stenographer, another MRT [medical radiation technologist] specialty which is
also pro-rated. So I’ll give the total number, but some of these are not
full-time positions. They’re pro-rated.
And so those positions, in addition to
that, we also have costs for the operations of the breast health centre as well
as some of the capital and the facility costs. But with respect to the people
positions, there’s about 8.8 new full-time equivalents in total, ranging from
those positions that I would have noted earlier.
So, Ingrid, do you want to give a little
bit more detail?
Ingrid Kirby:
— Good evening. I’m Ingrid Kirby, assistant deputy minister. So the breast
health centre in Regina is really meant to kind of mirror the centre that’s
already existing in Saskatoon, which really provides a holistic approach to
women who are facing a breast cancer diagnosis.
So once a patient has been given notice
that they have suspect cancer, they will meet with a nurse navigator. So
there’ll be two nurse navigator positions in Regina, and both of those are
filled now. Those nurse navigators will support that patient going through
their diagnostic journey. So through diagnostic mammography to their diagnostic
biopsies to getting their results, meeting with the breast radiologists, having
their initial consult with the breast surgeon, all of that will happen in the
Regina breast health centre.
And then when the patient requires
surgery, they will get their surgery done at the Pasqua or General Hospital,
and if they need oncology care, they’ll get that at the Cancer Agency’s Allan
Blair Cancer Centre here in Regina as well. And then any post-treatment will
occur, again, at the Regina breast health centre.
So the second phase of what we’re doing
here will expand the current footprint. So we’ll add additional space for the
lymphedema clinic. So that will move from the Pasqua Hospital to the breast
health centre, where patients can get all of that care in one location and have
better parking, which is always great too.
Vicki Mowat: —
So can you provide an update on the other positions, like 1.0 FTE manager, 1.0
FTE MRT, and whether those positions have been filled? Can you go to that
granular level, please?
[18:30]
Tracey Smith:
— Thanks again for the question. So just for clarity, we will follow up and get
some more detailed information later. Our budget documents right now have some
of the positions that are pro-rated and that’s why I wasn’t able to give you
the full count. But we’ll do some follow-up and be able to follow up and get
you that information.
Vicki Mowat: — Okay. Like later
this evening or . . . I mean just in terms of timeline?
Tracey Smith:
— As soon as we are able to get confirmation of the full count.
Vicki Mowat: — Okay, thank you.
Continuing on the vein of women’s health, I want to ask a question about the
fertility tax credit. There’s been multiple references to eligible expenses.
What will eligible expenses look like? I understand that it’s 50 per cent up to
$20,000, but just wondering what procedures the tax credit will cover.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So the fertility treatment tax credit, again eligible expenses up to $20,000
for a maximum refund of $10,000. I’ll just read off the eligibility criteria:
Eligible expenses are based on the
federal treatment of fertility expenses as determined under subsections
118.2(2) and (2.2) of the federal Income Tax Act. Fees must be paid to a
Saskatchewan licensed medical practitioner or fertility treatment within the
province of Saskatchewan. One lifetime claim per tax filer beginning in the
2025 taxation year. Fertility expenses in any 12‑month period ending in
the tax filing year can be claimed (as long as the expenses were not previously
claimed in another taxation year). Now this excludes any reimbursements such as
private health care coverage. Excludes the reversal of a vasectomy or tubal
ligation. Excludes travel expenses and excludes the purchase of eggs or sperm
outside of Saskatchewan.
Now
again, all these eligible expenses must be, you know, properly supported by
documentation, you know, such as receipts or invoices.
You
know, and I guess I should just note as well, individuals and couples in
Saskatchewan who incur fertility treatment expenses are eligible to claim costs
related to fertility treatments, travel, and prescription medications as they
normally would for purposes of claiming the medical expense tax credit for both
federal and provincial income tax purposes.
And
claiming the new Saskatchewan fertility treatment tax credit would not reduce
the amount that could be claimed for the medical expense tax credit, the METC.
Again, this is all administered through the income tax system by Canada Revenue
Agency, and 2025 is the first taxation year that this opportunity is available
to Saskatchewan individuals and families.
Sorry,
I should just say this information is on and the details are all available on
the Saskatchewan.ca website. I mean again, if there’s specific questions I
would refer to the Ministry of Finance just because, you know, for individuals
if there’s specific questions in terms of eligibility, the Ministry of Finance
is really the experts on tax, not necessarily the Ministry of Health. But,
yeah.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. I had
initially asked about knee and hip surgeries as well and the amount for
out-of-province. I’m wondering if you can provide that as well. I think last
year we had had 90 surgeries that were completed in Calgary. I’m just looking
for a comparable number for this past year.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So for the out-of-province hip and knee replacements, again this program ran
from May 1st, 2023 to September 30th, 2024. A hundred and twenty-five patients
took advantage of the temporary program. The cost to the Ministry of Health was
$3.14 million for that program.
I think it’s important to note, you know
again, the temporary nature of this program. You know, if we go back to
December 31st, 2021 there were over 3,000 patients waiting longer than 12
months for hip or knee replacement in Saskatchewan. Now December 31st, 2024, we
were down to 465 patients across the province waiting longer than 12 months for
hip and knee replacement. Again, the temporary program was a help to that, but
I think it’s more important to note that system capacity within the province
also has substantially increased in the last couple years.
You know, volumes of joint replacement
procedures performed in public hospitals in Saskatchewan increased by roughly
50 per cent from the 2018‑2019 fiscal year to the 2023‑2024 fiscal
year. It helps us, again, bring down that long wait-list for hip and knee
significantly to, you know, to only have 465 patients waiting longer than 12
months for hip and knee. Obviously there’s always more work to do, but compared
to where we were at the end of 2021, kind of in the throes of the pandemic,
some significant improvement.
[18:45]
And really thanks to the surgical teams
across the province in both of our two major cities as well as our regional
centres that also do a significant number of hip and knee procedures. And
really a lot of credit to provincial head of surgery, Dr. Kelly, you know, I
think for really being key in terms of leading some of this work and expanding
that capacity within the province.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. I want
to go back to decreases that we see in the Health budget. I’m looking at
SHA-targeted programs and services. Can you speak to why we’re seeing a
reduction in SHA-targeted programs and services in the budget year over year?
Hon. Jeremy Cockrill: — So I guess to
answer this question I’ll direct you, because we’re under subvote (HE03), so if
we go to the line above, you’ll see a $300,000 increase to the Saskatchewan
Health Authority base funding amount, going from 4.228 to 4.528. What I would . . .
or sorry, yeah.
Now again there is new programs and
funding added to the targeted programs and services line item, and you know, I
would point to some of them: $30 million for Saskatoon City Hospital,
$20.1 million for mental health and addictions, $15.1 million for
surgical volumes to get us to that 100,000 surgeries this next year,
$9 million for continuing care, and then the $7.6 million for
pediatric programs.
So again in the new programs and funding
under the targeted line is about $133 million, so that explains that.
That’s why you’re seeing a decrease on the targeted program and services line
but a significant increase to the base funding for the Saskatchewan Health
Authority.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. What
about with physician services? There’s a reduction of about 3.69 per cent year
over year.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So on the physician services line item, there’s a net decrease of, as you
noted, about $28 million. I will note though, in the line item there’s
about $93 million of new money, and that’s for the negotiated increases
with the Saskatchewan Medical Association, utilization pressures for
fee-for-service physicians across the province, and then about $21 million
for contracts for specialist physicians.
The reason that we see a net decrease on
this line item, though, is that as physicians, say, move to contract positions
within the SHA or Saskatchewan Cancer Agency or the College of Medicine, those
funding amounts are transferred to those organizations because obviously those
physicians might be, you know, would be working in one of those three
organizations.
So about 100, you know, so
$93 million in new money, 121-roughly million dollars being transferred to
those three organizations. Again, still funding going towards the employ of
physicians, just moving them from the Ministry of Health to those three partner
agencies.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. I’ll
also note that the Athabasca Health Authority budget remains stagnant. While
we’ve seen small increases in the Saskatchewan Health Authority and Cancer
Agency budgets as well, which you would think would remain comparable to what
the Athabasca budget is utilized for, can you speak to why that budget remains
stagnant? And what will be cut for the health authority to be able to keep pace
with inflation?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So the Athabasca Health Authority, you know, operates a little bit uniquely
compared to the Saskatchewan Health Authority. And I think we can understand,
you know, obviously the North is unique. And so, you know, that’s why we have
the AHA [Athabasca Health Authority].
So based on that, I’ll just say this. So
the revenue that the AHA receives is, you know, forecasted to be higher — quite
a bit, actually — higher than what was forecasted at budget time last year. And
so because of that, we actually forecast a fairly healthy surplus this year in
the Athabasca Health Authority of over four and a half million dollars. And so
you know, the accumulated surplus within the AHA is now . . . Their
cash balance is about between 10 and $11 million. So that’s fairly
significant, and so you know, they have a strong, healthy balance sheet.
So while the ministry operating grant to
the AHA remains the same number as last year’s budget, again because of the
strong surplus and the strong balance sheet position of the AHA, you know, I
think it’s fair to say we would feel comfortable with them being able to
continue operations as the communities of the North require without needing to
make negative changes to what patients and residents can expect in northern
communities for next year.
Chair Weger:
— It now being 7 p.m., the committee will recess until 7:30 p.m.
[The
committee recessed from 19:00 until 19:30.]
Chair Weger:
— Welcome back, committee members. We will now resume consideration of the
estimates and supplementary estimates no. 2 for the Ministry of Health.
Minister.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair. I was just speaking with Ms. Mowat. We do have some
information on questions that were asked by Mr. Jorgenson last night, just on
ALC [alternative level of care] patients. So I’ll just have Ingrid read that
into the record. And then we’ll also have the information that was previously
requested tonight on the breast health centre breakdown of positions, and we’ll
read that into the record as soon as we have that list available. So go ahead,
Ingrid.
Ingrid Kirby:
— Thank you. So this data is as of 8 a.m. this morning, so the numbers may be
slightly different than what Mr. Will would have said last night with the data
that he had at that time.
I’ll start with Regina. So at the Pasqua
Hospital as of 8 a.m. this morning, there were 29 patients who were classified
as alternate level of care. Of those, six were still in hospital due to
housing, financial, or social needs, so they were looking for basically a place
to live when they were discharged from hospital. Fourteen were waiting to be
transferred to another level of care, so potentially like a personal care or
long-term care home or a convalescent care bed. Two there was no barrier
selected so there’s no data specifically on what those patients were waiting
for. One required a primary health care consult or required palliative or home
care; and six needed to be cleared by therapy services, so they might have
needed physio or speech language or some type of therapy in order to be cleared
for discharge. So that’s Pasqua Hospital.
The Regina General Hospital, as of 8
a.m. this morning there were 41 alternate level of care patients. Of those, six
would have needed to find alternate housing or needed other types of community
supports. One needed community IV [intravenous] therapy. Three needed either a
specialist consult or a test required before they could be discharged.
Twenty-two required another level of care, so either long-term care, personal
care, convalescent care. Eight there was no barrier selected so there’s no data
by the unit to give determining factors here, and one required a therapy
consult.
So I’ll turn to Saskatoon. So again as
of 8 a.m. this morning at the Royal University Hospital there were 53 patients
who were alternate level of care. Of those, 14 required housing, financial, or
social supports. Two required IV therapies. Fourteen needed a consult or a test
before they could be discharged. Thirteen needed to be transferred to another
level of care, so again personal care home, long-term care type of thing. Two,
they were waiting for a bed at receiving facility so there might have been a facility,
but they needed a bit more complex care. Five had no barrier selected; and
three needed therapy to clear them for discharge.
At St. Paul’s Hospital this morning
there were 47 patients who were alternate level of care. Of those, three needed
housing, financial, or social supports. Three needed a consult or a test. Three
needed a physician-ordered prescription before they could be cleared. One there
was no available facility bed so they needed to be transferred to another level
of care. Three needed more complex care, so they needed a facility that could
provide a bit more complex care they couldn’t get right away. Thirty-one there
was no barrier selected so there was a data issue there that we need to dig
into a bit. Three needed therapies to clear them.
And at City Hospital this morning there
were a total of five patients. And so these again were a mix of housing,
financial, or social supports. Three had no barrier selected and one needed a
therapy consult to clear them. So that’s the total for Regina and Saskatoon.
And I think as Mr. Will noted yesterday, the SHA doesn’t collect data for other
facilities because the primary concerns around ALC are in these two tertiary
centres.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. And is
the breast health centre info available as well? Thank you.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So I’ll just list off the positions here. And again, you know, I’ll say 2 or 1
or 2.5. Again some might be slightly less than, you know, a 1.0 or might be
slightly more, depending on relief specifically or so on. But two MRTs, one
medical imaging scheduler, one diagnostic sonographer, 2.5 nurse navigator
positions, one manager position, one physiotherapist, one social worker, one
unit support worker, and two medical office assistants.
Those are all net new positions at the
new BHC [breast health centre] in Regina. Obviously some positions will be
moving over from the Pasqua once, as Ingrid mentioned earlier, once the
lymphedema clinic and the physiotherapy services are offered at the Regina
Crossing building, then some positions will just move over to the new building.
Vicki Mowat: — And which of those
positions have been filled already?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
All of them have been filled. The social worker competition, I believe, just
closed this week. So that one hasn’t technically been filled yet, but the
competition, I understand, just closed this week.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. As we
look at the health budget and we think about the current climate
internationally, what allowances have been made for the anticipated
tariff-driven increases to the cost of medical equipment and supplies?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Thank you, Mr. Chair. You know, maybe a couple comments on tariffs, and you
know, the potential impact on the health care system here in Saskatchewan. And
again it seems, in an earlier discussion about tariffs, uncertainty seems to be
the operative word in all of these discussions. I would say, you know, in the
budget as presented mid-March, there’s no specific allowance for tariffs. And
again we’ve been debating this in the House for a couple of weeks now in terms
of, you know, throughout the budget formation process tariffs have been on and
off and kind of on and off again. And you know, again who knows what is coming
tomorrow or weeks and months into the future.
[19:45]
I would say, you know, with the
contracts that we have with vendors on a contract-by-contract basis, there
would be I’d say normal escalators within contracts as to allow for increased
costs. That would be on a contract-by-contract basis. So you know, if we are to
find ourself in a tariff environment, I guess it’s early to say how exactly
that would be passed on to either the Saskatchewan Health Authority or 3sHealth
or other partner agencies within the province.
The exclusion of
pharmaceuticals, medical supplies, medical devices, medications, vaccines, and
veterinary products from counter-tariffs is not just a policy choice, it’s a
necessity tied directly to national interest and public health security. Canada
imports roughly 70 per cent of its pharmaceuticals and depends heavily on the
United States for medical devices, supplies, and related technologies. Tariffs
on these essential goods would immediately impact patient care, inflate health
care costs, and delay access to life-saving treatments across hospitals,
long-term care facilities, and communities nation-wide.
And then the letter goes on to say the
same applies to veterinary products. And of course that would be important to
our province’s livestock sector and so on. And I guess I share that just so
that the member knows, you know, this is a threat that we’re taking seriously.
You know, I would say the ministry, the
Saskatchewan Health Authority, 3sHealth, other health care agencies are in line
with government direction to prioritize Canadian-made products where possible.
However given that, as we’ve talked about before on the floor of this House,
there’s limited substitutability. And so we also would want to make sure that
patient care is not compromised, right. So certainly we’re taking a close look
both at a provincial level and then at a federal level through the HealthPRO procurement
organization that all provinces are a part of to see if there’s options to find
Canadian-made products.
I’ll just share as well, at the
HealthPRO level, you know, the HealthPRO organization that again helps
provinces with procurement is also working with many vendors to say, okay, if
your production is US [United States]-based do you have other options? Do you
have options to produce in Europe or another country that is not necessarily
embroiled in a trade battle? So certainly I guess I want to make sure that
we’re, you know, certainly not ignoring the risk that it poses, but the
priority again remains looking for opportunities to procure Canadian where
possible while not sacrificing patient care for people in the province.
Vicki Mowat: — What work has been
done to adjust our supply chains where possible?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So maybe I’ll just speak to, you know, some of the work that is ongoing, in a
very general sense at this point. I mean we’re obviously developing
preferential criteria for Canadian suppliers in all of our contracting
initiatives. There’s many existing contracts within the health care sector, and
so we are exploring those to determine if there’s opportunities for conversion
from an American supplier to a Canadian supplier, of course, you know, without
reaching terms of those existing agreements and also reviewing just the
clinical acceptability and the conversion costs around that.
You know, should note too that there’s
many arrangements that we have that are contract categories that are under
multi-supplier arrangements. So say, you know, you’ll have a supplier from the
US and Canada and maybe . . . or two from Canada. Obviously the focus
has been in recent weeks to focus on Canadian suppliers, shifting purchase
orders from American suppliers to Canadian suppliers where appropriate.
Mentioned already, asking international vendors with operations in several
countries to make sure that they’re providing products made in Canada to us, or
outside the United States. And then obviously communicating internally to staff
to prioritize Canadian companies in purchasing.
You know, I already spoke to the
HealthPRO, the work ongoing with HealthPRO, the national health care
procurement group. You know, just to my knowledge, there have been no contracts
cancelled as of yet, but again, you know, as I started off the last answer,
uncertainty is the operative word in this. And so we want to move cautiously,
especially around that clinical acceptability and conversion risk.
You know, I’ll just note as well the
pan-Canadian Pharmaceutical Alliance, which again Saskatchewan is a member of.
This is the group that negotiates drug costs, you know, between the provinces
and the drug manufacturers. You know, they’ve also raised with the federal
Ministry of Finance that retaliatory tariffs will very likely have negative
impact on the cost of drugs. Obviously, you know, we’re always making
improvements to provincial drug plan coverage, so any interruption to that
would be . . . There is the risk of patients being affected.
Obviously as I’ve mentioned here tonight here and previously, the priority
really is around patient care and making sure that we’re not interrupting what
patients may need.
Vicki Mowat: — I want to switch
gears a little bit and talk about federal funding. Is there any dedicated
funding right now, any bilateral agreements with the federal government that
earmark some portion of the Canada Health Transfer for a specific purpose?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So I’ll just try to provide some clarity on the federal funding that we do
receive. You know, the Canada Health Transfer, we budgeted 1.634 billion
in this budget year for the Canada Health Transfer. These are unrestricted
funds. So you know, I think we will openly quarrel with the federal government,
as will all other PTs [provinces and territories], to say it’s not sufficient.
It’s not what was originally committed to by the federal government. I think we
probably agree on that piece so I won’t go down that road, but that is an
unrestricted envelope of money.
We do have several bilateral agreements
that do have more specificity around them, I’ll say. We have the working
together shared health priorities bilateral. Again in this budget year, we
expect to receive $128.5 million in this fiscal year through that
bilateral.
And really those shared priorities in a
general sense are: expanding access to family health services, including in
rural and remote areas, which again that is definitely a priority of our
government; number two, supporting health care workers and reducing backlogs;
number three, improving access to quality mental health and substance abuse
services; and number four, modernizing health systems with health data and
digital tools.
Now the next bilateral we have is the
Aging with Dignity agreement. We expect to receive $36.7 million in this
fiscal year through that bilateral agreement. You know, again, really focusing
there on home and community care as well as long-term care services offered by
the ministry and all of its partners.
[20:00]
The latest bilateral that we signed with
the federal government was really the bilateral that has to do with improved
access for drugs for rare diseases for people. We signed that agreement just
earlier this year, January 10th, 2025. Minister Holland and I signed that
agreement in Saskatoon. You know, the first stage of that bilateral funding
goes to three specific drugs: Poteligeo, Oxlumo, and Epkinly. And so obviously
as time goes on, as part of that bilateral, we’ll see what priorities the next
federal government has around actioning their national strategy for drugs for
rare diseases.
Vicki Mowat: — When was the last
time you received a federal clawback or a decrease in the amount provided in
the Canada Health Transfer? I know it happened a couple of years ago because of
MRI companies charging patients, which breaks the Canada Health Act.
When was the last time that happened and what was the amount?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So unfortunately, the federal government claws back money every year as part of
their diagnostic services policy, you know, and maybe I’ll get into some of my
thoughts on that. It’s a two-year trailing amount. So for example, we just had
a clawback last month, so March 2025. That amount was 1.074 million. The
year before that . . . I’m sorry, the 1.074 million, that was
for the diagnostics completed in the ’22‑23 fiscal year, right, two years
prior to that. The clawback in March 2024 was 1.085 for the scans that happened
in the ’21‑22 fiscal. And then the deduction in March 2023 was 743,000
for the scans done in 2020‑2021 fiscal.
Again I think I’ve spoken about this
before, you know, and I had the opportunity to again express my concern, as
have previous Health ministers expressed the concern to their federal
counterpart around this deduction, which we believe is . . . The
whole two-for-one MRI and CT policy, I think, has really been successful in
terms of improving patient access to care. You know, it’s something that I
think has been good for Saskatchewan patients. We’re going to continue doing it
because overall it provides, I think, positive net value to the people of this
province, having that available.
It’s unfortunate the federal government
continues to hold the position they do and claw back those dollars, which again
we could keep here in the province and put back into doing more diagnostics for
Saskatchewan residents. But the clawback under the diagnostic services policy
is an annual thing in every March.
Vicki Mowat: — We will disagree
on this, but I don’t want to spend all night on it, so I’m going to move
forward. What’s the reservations with signing on to national pharmacare
programs to cover the costs of insulin, diabetes supplies, and contraceptives?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
You know, I guess in a general sense there’s no specific hesitation on our
part. In fact discussions have been ongoing with the federal government. In
fact I was in contact with Minister Holland on a regular basis pretty much
until the day that he was no longer the Minister of Health. Obviously a new
individual was named to that portfolio and then the federal election called
shortly after. You know, we expect that we’ll pick up those discussions with
the next federal government once the election concludes and a new cabinet is
named and the new minister has an opportunity to get his or her feet wet and up
to speed with the file.
I guess I would just say from another
general sense that any bilateral that we are going to sign with the federal
government specifically in Health, it has to enhance the services or coverage
that is available to Saskatchewan residents. And so you know, I’ll just say
initially some of the reservations from our end were around what appeared to be
a reduction in the number of drugs that would be covered under a federal
bilateral.
Again I thought we had some pretty
productive discussions with the federal government in recent months and made
some progress there. But those are on hold for the moment and we’ll pick that
up with the new minister once they’re named.
Vicki Mowat: — Minister, a
reduction compared to what?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
To the current listing under the Saskatchewan formulary.
Vicki Mowat: — Which covers who
exactly?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So obviously, you know, the Saskatchewan drug plan, it offers coverage to
. . . there’s some coverage to folks — you know, lower-income folks,
vulnerable populations, or under the special supports program. If your income
is very small and relative to the co-op cost of the drug, there’s supports
there as well, right, because there are some drugs that are very costly to use.
You know, I would just say again, the
negotiations are ongoing, and I guess the concerning part for us was the
initial formulary on the diabetes side — as laid out in the federal legislation
and by the federal government in the negotiations — was roughly half of what we
cover under the formulary in Saskatchewan. And so you know, it was important
that we weren’t going to go backwards in terms of coverage for folks already
receiving coverage on the drug plan to say, well now you’re going to receive
coverage on 50 per cent of the drugs that there was coverage on prior to that.
So that’s where again with negotiations
ongoing, a kind of a wait to see who the new federal minister will be so we can
pick that back up. As I said, you know, credit to Minister Holland. I would say
some progress was made over the last few months in terms of ensuring that any
bilateral enhances what Saskatchewan people have access to. That’s the goal in
all of this, right?
[20:15]
Vicki Mowat: — What is stopping
the provincial formulary in Saskatchewan from still continuing that coverage
and just layering the federal coverage on top of it? Why does it have to be
either/or instead of “yes, and”?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
I would just say, you know, the other challenge with any bilateral is the
financial sustainability piece of it long term. And so I appreciate where
you’re going with your question. I understand that. That’s a reasonable
question to ask, but we also have to make sure that if we’re signing on to a
bilateral and the bilateral ends in three or four years and there’s a fiscal
cliff on it, that we’re at a sustainable level where coverage can be continued
or managed for people.
So appreciate your question, but I would
just say again these are all . . . I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s an
either/or, but it’s trying to ensure again that we’re getting the best deal on
behalf of Saskatchewan taxpayers and residents, and something that helps
enhance coverage and is also fiscally sustainable for us as a province.
Vicki Mowat: —
I want to shift gears to talk about emergency rooms. Can we have an update on
the most recent emergency department wait data for each major centre — so
Regina, Saskatoon, Prince Albert, Lloyd, North Battleford — for all the four
different categories in the 90th percentile, so emergency department wait time
to physician initial assessment, emergency department wait time for in-patient
bed assignment, ED [emergency department] length of stay for admitted patients,
and ED length of stay for non-admitted patients?
Dave Morhart: — Hi. Dave Morhart,
executive director, acute and emergency services branch with the Ministry of
Health. I can go through that data for you here. So I can’t remember what order
you specifically asked it in, but the first one I can give you is the time to finish
physician initial assessment, and this is in minutes.
And I’m going to also state that the
latest we have for all of this data for all of the centres is October 2024. So
for Saskatoon — and this is in minutes — it was 66 minutes; Regina was 99;
Lloydminster, 103; North Battleford, 111; and Prince Albert was 89. And that
was for the median. Do you want both the median and 90th percentile?
Vicki Mowat: — I would like a 90th
percentile please, yeah.
Dave Morhart: — 90th percentile, okay. So the 90th
percentile, again in minutes, would be 238 for Saskatoon, 278 for Regina, 323
for Lloydminster, 281 for North Battleford, and 271 for Prince Albert.
Vicki Mowat: — And then do you have the timing for
in-patient bed, like the other three metrics? Thanks.
Dave Morhart: — I do. So the next one I have is time waited
for an in-patient bed, and this is in hours. So again to October 2024, and I’ll
give you the 90th percentile. So it’s 59.1 in Saskatoon, 20.4 in Regina, 7.4 in
Lloydminster, 4.1 in North Battleford, and zero in Prince Albert.
Vicki Mowat: — And then for admitted patients and
non-admitted patients?
Dave Morhart: — Yeah, so I can give you the admitted first.
Again 90th percentile and in hours, October 2024: Saskatoon was 70.8; Regina,
27.6; Lloydminster, 23.9; North Battleford, 16.6; and
Prince Albert, 12.7. And then for length of stay for discharged 90th percentile
to October, and this is in hours again: Saskatoon was 8.6; Regina, 8.7;
Lloydminster, 12; North Battleford, 7.6; and Prince Albert, 8.9.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you for
that. I want to talk a little bit about bed capacity in our acute care
facilities. I understand that work has recently taken place to assess bed
capacity in Saskatoon. Can you speak to that and which company was contracted,
what their report looked like, etc.?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Some of the work that the member references around understanding current bed
capacity and future needs for bed capacity in Saskatoon, we’ve been working
with a company called AnalysisWorks. I believe they’re out of British Columbia,
a Canadian company. So working with them to understand what we have, what our
future needs are going to be.
And then, you know, I would say work is
still ongoing between the Saskatchewan Health Authority and our master space
planning efforts with AnalysisWorks. You know, we’ve had some initial
information from AnalysisWorks. Now we’re validating that and understanding
kind of what can be done. And really out of this work, that’s really where the
Saskatoon City Hospital project I guess was birthed out of in the sense of, you
know, we know we have need. We have an opportunity here to make a significant
adjustment on services being offered in one of the tertiary buildings, which
will then open up a bunch more acute beds — 109 acute care beds new in
Saskatoon City Hospital.
You know, again your last question on
emergency departments, this is the sort of investment that has some pretty
significant impact on emergency departments, specifically in Saskatoon. And so
again the work between the SHA and AnalysisWorks continues to be ongoing,
continues to, you know, validate some of the numbers going back and forth
between AnalysisWorks and the SHA.
But again the importance of this work
can’t be understated, especially as it relates to, you know, specifically the
Saskatoon City Hospital. And really I think there’s opportunities in our other
major tertiary centres as well — a couple of our Regina facilities as well as
the other two Saskatoon facilities — to re-evaluate how space is being used in
all those buildings. Again these are expensive buildings to build, expensive
buildings to run so we want . . . I’ll say, you know, generally speaking
we want to make sure that the highest level of patient care is occurring in
these buildings as possible. And I think that just makes good common sense.
Vicki Mowat: — Minister, can you
speak to what the recommendations were from AnalysisWorks in terms of the
number of beds that needed to be built and what the timeline looked like?
[20:30]
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So I’ll say, again specifically in Saskatoon, you know, AnalysisWorks in their
review and our ongoing work with them they identified the need to add 155 beds
in Saskatoon over the next seven years. You know, again just with the Saskatoon
City Hospital project and adding 109 acute care beds there, we’re I’d say more
than a good chunk of the way there within a year or two. And again that’s just
the first opportunity.
Again I’ve spent time in all three
Saskatoon hospitals. You know, it’s quite clear that the need for the City
Hospital project is there. There’s the opportunity to do that. I think there’s
other opportunities in the other two Saskatoon facilities as well. And so I’m
confident that 155 minus 109, you know, we’re talking 46 beds there. I’m
optimistic that us working between the SHA, SaskBuilds, and Emmanuel Health
that obviously operates St. Paul’s, you know, I’m optimistic that we’ll be able
to find opportunities to meet that capacity gap over the next seven years.
Vicki Mowat: —
Can you speak to what year . . . You know, there’s been a lot of
reference to the fact that this is a multi-year project. Can you speak to what
year we expect to see 109 additional beds operational at Saskatoon City
Hospital? And I guess further, what the incremental change will be every year,
like next fiscal year, the year after, etc.?
Andrew Will:
— Andrew Will, CEO of the Saskatchewan Health Authority. I just want to start
out by saying how much we appreciate the investment in opening additional
capacity in Saskatoon. And I would just say, you know, we’ve been talking about
some of the challenges with emergency room capacity. And really that results
from, you know, where we have patients that have been admitted needing a
placement in hospital, and then a shortage of beds.
So the investment is 109 beds. It’ll
happen through four phases. The time frame is about 16 months for that. The
first phase will be 22 acute rehab beds as well as 12 acquired brain injury
beds. In order to do that we’ll be relocating a geriatric evaluation management
unit clinic from Saskatoon City Hospital to a commercial real estate space in
the community. And so we’ll be starting to procure that space immediately.
There’ll be some renovations required to accommodate that program and we’ll be
onboarding staffing to open those units.
Phase 2 will be opening a 30‑bed
in-patient general medicine unit in space that’s currently occupied by some
continuing care spaces for people that are waiting placement into long-term
care facilities. The third phase will be another 30‑bed general medicine
unit as well. And the fourth phase is 15 high-acuity beds that will be opened
up, and we’ll be basically moving the pre-admission clinic for surgery into
commercial space in the community. And that’s very similar to how we operate in
Regina currently.
So basically there’ll be some time at
the front end of that just to do the project planning, to get ready for the
commercial space, and then renovations both in the commercial space as well as
some minor renovations in the hospital as well to accommodate those programs.
And then it’s about a four-month-ish amount of time for each of those phases to
come into place.
Vicki Mowat: — So in phase 2 you
talked about the fact that it would displace some continuing care and patients
awaiting long-term care. What is the plan for where those patients will go?
Andrew Will:
— Yeah, so basically we . . . I’ll just have to get the details of
that. Just one second. So sorry about that. I just had to make sure I was clear
on the question. So that’ll be renovated continuing care space for that move.
Vicki Mowat: — Do you have a
sense of where that will take place?
Andrew Will:
— So we’ll be looking for options. We’re going out to tender to look for spaces
in the community that we’d be able to reallocate those spaces.
Vicki Mowat: — What about for
phase 3? You talked about another 30‑bed medicine unit which
. . . Where is the plan for where that will be located in the current
Saskatoon City Hospital? And who would that displace?
[20:45]
Andrew Will: — Thank you. I just wanted to confirm what
our plan is there. So basically it’s similar capacity so we’d be looking for,
through that RFP [request for proposal], the similar approach and evaluating
options available.
Vicki Mowat: — So in terms of the 109 beds, is this
incremental to the total number of beds that exist at Saskatoon City Hospital
right now, or are some of those beds replacing other beds that exist? Because
it sounds like some of these patients are being moved
elsewhere into community.
Andrew Will:
— So these are all additional new acute care bed capacity. And so basically the
units that are displaced and moved to community are the geriatric evaluation
management out-patient clinic that moves into retail space. And as I mentioned,
we have some space that we’re currently using for transition for continuing
care into community as well that’s moving.
So all 109 beds are additional acute
care space and then we’re moving services to community and other settings to
more appropriately care for those patients in other settings that don’t need to
be in a hospital.
Vicki Mowat: — Sure, but of
course like there’s the transitional . . . I can’t remember what the
wing is called. The transitional care unit, you know, has a set of beds that
are there. Like that’s going to be moved out of the hospital, yes?
Andrew Will:
— Well the way I would describe that is there’s been a lot of work done over
the past year on patient flow. And we’ve really improved the turnaround time to
transition continuing care residents more quickly into long-term care
facilities. So basically those improvements are really replacing the
requirement to have that unit in hospital.
Vicki Mowat: — Right. Like the
discrete number of beds, the total number of beds at Saskatoon City Hospital is
not going to increase by 109 if that transitional care unit moves elsewhere, or
people seek care in community. I can’t remember how many beds are in that, maybe
40.
Andrew Will:
— The key piece there is there’s services in City Hospital currently that don’t
need to be there. All those needs will be met in community outside of hospital,
and we will have, at the end of the four phases, 109 beds available to admit
patients.
So on any given day, we have about 55
patients that are “admit, no beds” on average across Saskatoon. And this 109
beds will really help us address a timely flow of those patients into acute
care and help really, really divert some of those services that don’t need to
be in hospital to other locations.
Vicki Mowat: — And I certainly
understand that.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
I’ll just say and I think you can understand, you know, I see where you’re
going with the discrete number of beds in the physical building. The point
though is really around what level of care that a bed can offer, right. And so
when we talk about Saskatoon City Hospital, and you know, being able to look
out in the future and make sure that we can offer the hours that we’d like to
at Saskatoon City Hospital emergency, like this is key in terms of helping us
get there, right.
And so obviously, you know, as Andrew
has just outlined, we’ll be working through tender, through existing partners
within the community where there is opportunity to move services into the
community.
But the focus here is really ensuring
that the beds at Saskatoon City Hospital can provide that higher level of care,
help with patient flow, reduce the pressure in Saskatoon, and make sure
. . . At the end of the day what this is all about is patients in
Saskatoon — and Saskatoon draws from a large catchment area; there’s EMS
services from all over kind of that central part of the province that drive
into and take patients into Saskatoon — making the patient experience better in
the city of Saskatoon, specifically at City Hospital.
Vicki Mowat: — Undoubtedly I
understand the need for more medicine beds in the capacity plan. I fully
understand this. I can appreciate it. My question is to those beds that exist,
that are in the transitional care unit. How many beds are in that space? How
many beds total are we talking about displacing to other areas in community to
allow for this project to go forward?
Andrew Will: — In phases 1 and 4
there’s no reduction of beds in City Hospital. In phases 2 and 3 there’s 60
beds that we’ll be moving out, and we’ll be finding options through procurement
in community, looking at options there. And so net there’s 109 new acute care beds
in City Hospital. There’ll be a move of 60 beds out into community, but net,
it’s an additional 109 beds for Saskatoon.
Vicki Mowat: — So just to
clarify, that’s the convalescent unit and the transitional care unit? That adds
up to 60 according to my math.
Andrew Will:
— That’s right.
Vicki Mowat: — Okay. Perfect. And
I believe they said that the project is anticipated to take place over 16
months. So what is the — spare me doing a little bit more math this evening —
what is the projected end date of when all these beds will be operational?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So considering that, you know, the project I’d say really kicked off in March
of this year . . . I mean there was an allocation as part of our
additional funds in the ’24‑25 fiscal year. So take a start date of March
roughly and go 16 months from there. We’re looking into the fall of 2026, or
summer to fall 2026.
Andrew Will:
— But important to note there that as each phase is completed, we’ll have new
capacity coming online. So we’ll get the benefit of additional capacity sooner than
the end of that timeline.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Yes.
[21:00]
Vicki Mowat: — In terms of bed
capacity across our other centres, is Regina also being looked at in the same
way? Do we know what their bed capacity needs look like in the next seven years
as well?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So we’ve also done work through AnalysisWorks on Regina bed capacity. You know,
the comparable number to what I provided to you earlier puts kind of the need
over the next seven years somewhere between an additional 80 to 90 beds.
Again in Regina we have not yet
initiated master planning work for Regina facilities. You know, and I think
it’s important to note there’s a key difference between where we’re currently
at in Saskatoon and where we’re currently at in Regina. I think a significant
part of that is actually the urgent care centre.
You know, I’ve spoken about it before; I
spoke about it in my opening comments. You know, the UCC [urgent care centre]
on north Albert has now seen over 30,000 patients since opening last summer.
When we talk about patient flow, right, that’s the conversation that we had
just a few minutes ago on the positive impact that the Saskatoon City Hospital
project will have. That really centres around patient flow, being able to move
patients through our facilities quicker to make sure they have quicker access to
the level of care that they need.
In Regina, again having the urgent care
centre open the last many months has, you know, provided another outlet for
patients to flow through, obviously at a lower acuity, which again helps to
lessen the pressure on other facilities in the city, so you know, certainly we
. . . As with Saskatoon, there will be more beds required in Regina.
You know, at some point we’re going to start working on the master space
planning for the Regina facilities. But again, having the urgent care centre in
Regina has been a major help in terms of lessening the pressure in this city
compared to Saskatoon.
Vicki Mowat: —
Thank you. In terms of referring to the Regina Urgent Care Centre as a success,
what metrics are being used to track that? You’re referring to the number of
patients who have been through. But in terms of the goal, which was I think
pretty publicly stated as to divert patients from Regina emergency rooms, what
metrics are being used to determine whether it’s been successful on that front?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So I’ll say first off, and especially just because this is a priority that as a
government we’ve been public about, you know, since the fall, and that is
really around providing better access to the level of care that a patient
needs. And again I come back to, you know, the over 30,000 presentations. These
are presentations that likely would have occurred, you know, could have
occurred at one of the two emergency departments in Regina or maybe another
facility in the general area, or maybe people not presenting anywhere and then,
you know, I think we can all agree that there could be negative consequences of
that down the road. So I think when we talk about access to care, this really
. . . I think that’s important, you know, 30,000 presentations that
have happened at that facility.
The other piece that I would really cite
is — and you know, this is something that was really the first of its kind that
we’re aware of in a similar type facility in Canada — and that’s really the
mental health and addictions triage process having a separate entrance, having
a separate triage facility. When I toured the UCC several weeks ago, again
dedicated staff to that portion of the building. And so you know, if I’m
presenting with a mental health concern or for substance misuse, there’s
dedicated staff that would be attending to me or a family member.
So just looking at the numbers at the
urgent care centre, I mean typically, you know, we are somewhere between say an
average of three to six mental health presentations a day at the UCC. These are
often complex situations and again situations that probably are, you know, many
times . . . well I shouldn’t generalize but I think in many ways can
be better served in that urgent care centre facility rather than an emergency
department in many cases. And you know, there are better connections into the
community and being able to connect people with the support services that they
need.
And as the UCC has been open, we’ve seen
a general trend of mental health and substance misuse visits to both the Regina
General and Regina Pasqua emergency rooms, which I think is a positive thing
for other patients seeking emergency care. Again there’s always aberrations in
that data. Certain weeks there’s, you know, different things going on of
course, but the general trend is moving in the right direction in those two
facilities, with the urgent care centre taking on I guess more of that load,
you could say, in the city of Regina.
[21:15]
Now that we’ve been open say roughly
nine months at the urgent care centre, we’re currently undergoing a review
process with the staff there and with the team in Regina, again to better
understand what we’re seeing, the types of patients we’re seeing, and then
making sure that really that facility is aligned to what we need most in
Regina. So you know, as we have more information there . . . And also
I say a key part of that is collecting patient feedback and making sure that we
have a way to track success with how patients view their experience at the
facility.
I can say anecdotally the experiences
that I’ve heard about directly from people have been quite positive at the
urgent care centre, and so I think that’s really encouraging. But you know,
it’s easy to get lost in anecdotes. And as part of the review, we’ll be
developing some metrics on that that we can measure on an ongoing basis, you
know, in years two, three, four, and years down the road.
Vicki Mowat: — What has been the
total cost of the Regina urgent care facility, both operating and capital?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So the capital cost of the Regina Urgent Care Centre totalled $21 million,
including IM/IT [information management/information technology]. Now I should
take this moment, and I know we had a member’s statement in the House earlier
today about the Hospitals of Regina Foundation and An Evening in Greece — great
event. Absolutely. And I have to give credit to the HRF [Hospitals of Regina
Foundation] for their contribution of $2.4 million to the urgent care
centre to cover FF&E [furniture, fixtures, and equipment]. That was very
generous by the team at the Hospitals of Regina Foundation, as many other
foundations around the province are generous in their respective communities.
In terms of the operational costs in ’24‑25
for the urgent care centre, again still just a forecast considering the fiscal
year ended yesterday, but our forecast for operational costs at that specific
facility, 14.825 million.
Vicki Mowat: — And what is the
capital? Sorry, or did you say that already?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
21 million, including IM/IT part of that project. And the 2.4
. . . You know, within that is a $2.4 million contribution from
HRF.
Vicki Mowat: — What is IM/IT?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So information management and IT.
Vicki Mowat: — Okay, thank you.
And then there’s an additional 1.9 million that’s being added in this
budget. Can you speak to what that is for?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So the reason for that 1.9 million is obviously, you know, with the
opening of the urgent care centre in July, we didn’t have a full fiscal year in
the ’24‑25 fiscal. So we’ve added in this year’s budget to account for a
full year fiscal, and again knowing that, you know, volumes of the UCC have
fluctuated. They have been . . . And that’s something that we’ll
continue to monitor as part of our review process, understanding what the
trends are and perhaps what we need to look at for future budget allocations
for this urgent care centre and all the other future urgent care centres that
we’re getting planning under way for across the province.
Vicki Mowat: —
Thank you. In terms of the Saskatoon urgent care centre, I understand there is
a much smaller allocation of the budget that’s being allocated to the Saskatoon
facility. Can you speak to where it’s at in terms of its development and when
it’s expected to open, what the reasons are for the delay? Because certainly
these centres were announced at the same time and are in very different stages.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So as you noted, construction under way for the Saskatoon urgent care centre,
the partnership with Ahtahkakoop Cree Developments. We expect construction to
finish in December of 2026 and the UCC there to open to patients in early 2027.
You know, there definitely have been
some unique challenges with this project. Number one, the site, you know,
limited options in terms of sites available in Saskatoon somewhat being
adjacent to an existing facility, particularly St. Paul’s which, you know, it
was our desire to have this located on the west side of Saskatoon to ease some
of the pressures there. So there were some site challenges. It’s on a former
school site. The school was operational for a time. As well, some additional
land needed to be purchased. We purchased some adjacent residential properties
as we needed that space. So again land assembly takes time, no doubt about
that.
The other piece I think that’s taken
some time is really around the development of the partnership. This is a unique
partnership. It’s something I know the Premier is particularly proud of in
terms of building a unique relationship with a First Nation community in our
province that allows them to deliver a building that is going to be well used
by the public in that city and, I think, have a relationship with government
that, you know, works financially for the Nation but also allows us to deliver
services without government taking on the capital cost, or the full capital
cost of it.
So you know, again the smaller
allocation in the budget really has to do with the fact that ACD [Ahtahkakoop
Cree Developments], as part of the agreement, is responsible for delivering the
building. There are some costs that government incurs on an ongoing basis,
again, you know, the land, different consulting fees on an ongoing basis to
help support the project. But ACD is responsible for delivering the building,
and we look forward to having a long-term lease arrangement with ACD for this
space.
Vicki Mowat: — What is the
expected timeline for the other five additional urgent care centres?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Yeah, so I’ll just make a comment. I mean there’s a million dollars in this
year’s budget for planning. You know, obviously in the Throne Speech three more
communities were highlighted: Moose Jaw, Prince Albert, North Battleford.
And certainly, again, given I think some
of the initial success in terms of providing better access to patient care in
Regina, you know, recognizing the need for an additional facility in Regina, an
additional facility in Saskatoon. Again, just given how both of the two larger
cities in our province are growing — you know, growing certainly in terms of
population but they’re also growing in terms of geographic size, to get from
one side of Regina to the other or one side of Saskatoon to the other — you know,
we want to make sure that patients, our residents and families that live in all
parts of the city, have reasonable access to the type of health care facilities
that them and their families need.
I would say in terms of timeline, too
early to say yet on those five facilities. I will say that we’re doing
engagement with physician groups in all of those communities, again
understanding that this is a different model of care than what we have seen up
to this point delivered by the Saskatchewan Health Authority.
So you know, obviously I think what’s
exciting about the urgent care centre in Regina is we’re seeing a mixture of
emergency doctors and family medicine doctors as well as nurse practitioners
delivering care. I think that’s, you know . . . I did second reading
of The Regulated Health Professions Act
today, which really speaks to kind of the variety of professions that we have
in the province that serve patients.
[21:30]
So you know, taking what’s been done in
Regina and saying, okay, we want to have advanced engagement with these
physician groups and all the communities, understand what the current capacity
is, understand what the interest is, especially from the family medicine groups
in each of these communities, and then contemplating different models of what
the urgent care centre could look like in those communities.
So I’d say too early to speak to a
specific timeline in any one of those five projects, but certainly as there’s
more information to share, you can be sure that I will look forward to sharing
more information with specifically those communities and just the public at
large. I’d say there’s a high degree of interest in the public around urgent
care centres and the type of care model it’s offering. And people are, I’d say,
looking forward to it advancing forward and being present in more communities
around the province.
Vicki Mowat: — Minister, what’s
the plan to staff these facilities? There’s been a significant staffing
challenge at the Regina Urgent Care Centre — amount of overtime paid, you know,
the amount of pay that is going to emergency room physicians to entice them to
the urgent care centre away from the emergency rooms. You know, we’re hearing
concerns about the fact that it’s recruiting from the same pool of emergency
room docs.
What is the plan to get the Regina
Urgent Care Centre fully operational? You know, I think about adding an
additional shift and how much that would cost for only an additional
1.9 million operating. I’m not sure how it’s going to take place, so I’m just
wondering what the plan is there.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Well to speak specifically to the physicians side, I guess this is exactly why
we’re doing that advance engagement I talked about with physician groups in
those communities because again, understanding where those physician groups are
at currently in terms of staffing, understanding their interest in
participating in picking a new model of care in their community. You know, when
we talk about the allied workforce . . . Sorry, just staying on the
physician piece just for a moment. I think that advance engagement will help us
as part of our planning and being confident with what the physician complement
of each of these facilities look like. Again, any time you do something for the
first time you’re going to learn lessons. You’re going to take what you learn
and apply it to the next time you do something, and I think we can say that
that’s what we’re actively doing on the urgent care centre model.
In terms of the allied workforce, again
this is part of our health human resources action plan, you know, certainly
expanding training opportunities, expanding recruitment opportunities,
incentives that are in place in many communities around the province. So you
know, staffing will continue to be a topic of conversation within government. I
mean obviously we’ve got a significant project under way in Prince Albert.
We’ve got long-term care projects all around the province. So this is exactly
the type of work that we’re engaged with between the ministry and the SHA and
of course the Saskatchewan Healthcare Recruitment Agency to understand the need
and then again work with our post-secondary partners in the province, and then
as well as develop strategies to fill gaps with out-of-province recruitment as
needed.
Vicki Mowat: — I have questions
about so many things you just talked about. In terms of recruiting emergency
room physicians, the incentive that was announced in December of this year, how
many folks have applied for that incentive? How many times has it been awarded so
far? It’s been a few months.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So on the incentives, a couple of them specifically targeted at emergency
medicine physicians. I’ll just say on the medical residency incentive program,
you know, it provides bursaries for those in residency. Again they need to
complete a full year of service to receive the bursary. So just given that we
just announced this in December, there hasn’t been a full year of service
because it was announced in December but effective back in July. So you know,
we expect there’s about seven residents that would be eligible for this
provided they complete their year of service.
Around the hard-to-recruit specialist
incentive, again that’s the $200,000 over five years that are offered to
several different specialties, emergency medicine being one of those. Again we
won’t see applicants for that until later in this year. That is an incentive
though that we have seen success in other specialties. We’ve seen some real
success there in the specialty of anesthesiology, with six recruited under that
incentive and currently in the province, and then two in the specialty of
psychiatry currently practising in the province.
I’ll just make a comment on the
recruitment of emergency docs though. I will say I’ve had the opportunity to
engage with quite a few emerg med docs in the province over the last couple of
months. Hearing specifically about the challenges they see, but I think really
around the opportunities. You know, something that I’ve heard directly from
physicians is that they actually see opportunities right now to recruit,
potentially with more success than previous, out of the United States, and to
recruit doctors that maybe are from Saskatchewan or have a Saskatchewan
connection, or quite frankly, are Canadian doctors that just are now faced with
some uncertainty around their visa status in the United States. So again,
taking that direct feedback from physicians in the province.
You know, we’ve been working closely
with both the Ministry of Health and the Saskatchewan Healthcare Recruitment
Agency. Later this week we’ll be rolling out a specific targeted advertising
campaign, you know, at a few different specialties, to doctors practising in
the United States. Again talking about, you know, the lifestyle that we enjoy
here in Saskatchewan, the relatively low cost of living that we enjoy in
Saskatchewan and really, I think, certainty around their ability to practise
and not be faced with concern around their visa status in the United States.
And I should say that there’s been some
good work done, you know, between the ministry and the College of Physicians
and Surgeons in recent years on the licensure pathway for doctors who have
practised in the United States. So again because of that good work, that sets
us up well that again, hopefully, we can see some dividends being paid out of a
very targeted marketing campaign, specifically targeted — anesthesiology,
emergency medicine, and family medicine. And I think there’s opportunity here
so we should take the opportunity while it’s there.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. I want
to switch gears a little bit and talk about AIMS [administrative information
management system]. What’s the current estimated date for AIMS to be fully
implemented and functional, all phases?
[21:45]
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So maybe I’ll just make some general comments, and then I’m going to pass it
over to Mark with 3S [Health Shared Services Saskatchewan]. He can speak
specifically to how we have adjusted kind of the release waves going forward
over the next year.
So we expect the completion of the
project to be, for the time validation scheduling aspect of AIMS, to be
complete in January of 2026. Again there has been, you know, challenges that
we’ve had with the initial AIMS rollout. We were pulled back at a time, decided
to re-evaluate, and then set ourselves on a better course. I’m going to let
Mark speak specifically to what the release timeline will look like and how
we’re phasing that across the province.
I will just say I’ll commend the work
that has been done at 3S in terms of collecting feedback from front-line
workers, taking that into account, and then I think being very thoughtful with
this plan in terms of how we’re going to roll this out. You know, I’ve said to
many people on the AIMS topic: change is hard. New IT systems, you know, we can
all remember when we’ve gotten a new device or a new software. It takes some
time. But you know, down the road, I think there’s going to be some really
positive things coming out of this.
I will say, you know, actually meeting
with front-line health care workers this week talking specifically about AIMS,
actually it’s a very positive feedback just in terms of how some of their own
feedback has been collected, used, and informed really how the project has been
adjusted.
But maybe I’ll let Mark introduce
himself and then just talk about kind of how the phases of time validation and
scheduling will roll out over the next year here.
Mark Anderson:
— Sure. Thank you. My name is Mark Anderson. I’m the CEO at 3sHealth. So as the
minister mentioned, we are phasing in the implementation of the remainder of
AIMS, and I’ll just set a bit of context.
So we went live in late June 2024 with
what we call wave 1, which was really all of our core functionality for human
resources, supply chain, and finance for the entire health system, and that’s
the part that’s in. That’s a very significant component of the project that’s
already in. And we’ve been stabilizing the system and continue to work in that
space. But we’ve done really well, and we’ve seen things progress to a place
where we’re ready to proceed to the final stage or wave of AIMS, which we call time
validation and scheduling, as the minister mentioned.
So in an effort to ensure that we can
get this in successfully and ensure that there’s time for people to learn, to
fix any issues, we have gone with a six-release phase, six different releases,
the first one starting in May and the last one concluding in January. So that’s
part of our strategy to ensure that we can implement this. This is a very
significant implementation as was AIMS across the entire system. You know, it’s
something that is really a major undertaking, and so there’s a lot of different
activities under way to ensure that we are mitigating the risk of this
implementation.
First off we’ve really heavily engaged
users in the design of the system to ensure that it works and meets their
needs. So we’ve done extensive user design over the last year to ensure that
their voices are heard and the system is highly usable. We know that was a key
piece of feedback we had, and so that’s been an important step.
We spent the last number of months with
significant testing efforts, and testing is in a lot of different areas to
ensure that it’s going to work and that it’s thoroughly tested. So we do what
we call unit testing, so that’s how the actual system will perform with a
specific function. We do integrated testing which is end-to-end testing from
the project team. We’ve had really positive results coming out of that. Any
defects that were found get resolved quickly.
We’re now in user-accepted testing which
is where it’s out to the broader population to actually test its usability in
the broader population. And then we do what’s called performance testing, and
that is putting it under strain to test it and ensure it can handle the load,
the actual number of users that will concurrently use it. So lots of activities
under way in that space right now.
The staged rollout I mentioned is a key
part of our activities to ensure we can manage this change successfully. One of
them that’s actually not part of the six releases that I mentioned is a pilot
that actually is live. So we do have a small subset of the population that is
fully live with AIMS on time validation and scheduling. And that’s just another
way to help us test and ensure that it’s ready for use.
We’ve also significantly increased our
training and change activities. We are hosting biweekly town halls, information
sessions, and demos. We have multi-modality training under way right now as
part of it and a lot of different activity in terms of business structures and
data cleanup that needs to go into the system to ensure it works. So lots of
different activity under way.
We’re really excited about this wave of
AIMS. This is where, you know, we’re going to see a lot of the actual
scheduling and ability for front-line staff to be able to better manage their
schedules and their daily activities. So you know, that’s one of the key things
that we’re going to see with this particular wave of AIMS in the six different
releases.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. The
last total project cost I saw was around $240 million, $250 million.
Can you speak to the total project cost to date as well as what is in the
upcoming year’s budget that’s allocated for AIMS?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So you know, we just had Mark up here talking about the adjusted release
schedule for this next wave of AIMS. You know, based on that, we expect the
total project cost to be $276.7 million.
Again the $240 million number you
referenced, I mean that’s a bit of an older number from the Provincial Auditor.
So you can, I’m sure, appreciate that there’s been some changes to the
structure of the project. And I can’t emphasize enough, I guess, the fact that
we have gone to six different release dates, the fact that we’ve added all this
user testing, performance testing, the pilot that we have ongoing right now.
That does add to the length of implementation, so it adds to the cost because
that means we are engaging the project team longer, we’re running our legacy
systems longer.
But I can’t emphasize enough that really
that was driven again by feedback directly from the front line, hearing
feedback from them in terms of making sure that this would be a successful
rollout. And then also on the other side, doing it in a way that was going to
interrupt patient care as little as possible, right? That’s really, I think,
one of the major goals here is making sure that we’re adding this functionality
to how we operate but without affecting what patients see on a daily basis.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. Did you
find out what is budgeted in the upcoming year?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Pardon me. Sorry. $32.9 million is budgeted in this upcoming year.
Vicki Mowat: — And that’s in
addition to the 276?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
No, that’s inclusive.
Vicki Mowat: — Inclusive of,
okay. Thank you. And is this a Canadian-based company that is implementing
AIMS? Who’s running it?
[22:00]
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So the lead vendor on the AIMS project is obviously Deloitte Canada. So, you
know, that group is based in Canada. Obviously underneath Deloitte there’s
several different vendor groups as part of this project.
Again I would say, you know, some of
these companies do have US head offices, but I would say they also have
significant Canadian presences as well including, you know, data centres. I
mean the data for all this project will be housed within Canada which I think
is an important consideration, especially dealing with employee information.
But Deloitte Canada as the lead vendor is a Canadian company.
Vicki Mowat: — Can we get the
list of the vendor groups, please?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
What we can do is we’ll work on that list for you and provide it to you when we
can put that together.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you,
Minister. I want to switch gears and talk about the health care workforce as
well as retention challenges. And I’m not sure if the minister will have these
details or will refer me to another ministry, but we’ll see.
There’s
reference in the budget to additional training seats under the health care
portfolio for Advanced Education; in particular, 60 new training seats that
were announced for nurse practitioners, RPNs [registered psychiatric nurse],
MRTs. Can you speak to how many seats are dedicated to each of those
designations?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So, Ms. Mowat, I’ll provide you the breakdown that I have. You know, I suppose
if you have more detailed questions, it’ll probably end up being an Advanced
Education question, but I’ll provide the breakdown that I have.
So there are 60 seats, 60 new
incremental seats that are available in Saskatchewan, and there’s actually
three seats that are . . . And you know, you would know this is a
common practice to purchase seats for professions that we don’t train in province,
purchase them at out-of-province institutions and reserve them for Saskatchewan
students. So I’ll just start with the three, and then we can move on to talk
about the 60 in province.
So funded in this year’s budget is a
two-seat increase of electroneurophysiology technologists, and that program’s
offered through BCIT [British Columbia Institute of Technology] in Vancouver.
So that brings our total funded seats to four per year there in that specific
profession. And then we’ve also added one seat in the nuclear medicine
technology space, bringing our total funded seats there to five per year, and
that’s at SAIT [Southern Alberta Institute of Technology] in Calgary.
So again, programs, professions that are
still very important to our health care system here in the province, but
utilizing relationships that we have with other provinces to make sure that
those seats can be filled with Saskatchewan students.
So in terms of the 60 seats and how they
break down by profession, so 10 new seats for medical radiology technology,
which brings the new first-year intake this year to 50 students or 50 seats; 16
new registered psychiatrist nurse seats, which brings the first-year intake
seat total this year to 120; 24 new registered nursing seats, which brings this
year’s first-year intake seat total to 862; 10 new nurse practitioner seats,
which brings the intake number to 75. And that is how the 60 seats in Saskatchewan
break down.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you. There
was an announcement in the budget around supports for 65 new and enhanced
permanent full-time nursing positions. Can you explain what that means and
provide a bit of detail on who these positions are for, what they look like? I
don’t really know what . . . I think it’s new and enhanced, which
just . . . I have more questions than answers. So if you could
provide some detail, I’d appreciate that.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So what we mean by enhanced is temporary or part-time positions that have been
enhanced to permanent full-time positions, and that’s both with respect to
vacant postings but also with respect to current employees to help with
retention. If an individual was employed as a part-time or a temporary, some
positions in these designations across these communities are enhanced to now to
be permanent full-time positions.
And you know, some of the communities
where these positions are located: Arcola, Beauval, Broadview, Buffalo Narrows,
Davidson, Esterhazy, Fort Qu’Appelle, Grenfell, Herbert, Ile-a-la-Crosse,
Kamsack, Kipling, La Loche, La Ronge, Leader, Maple Creek, Melville, Nipawin,
Outlook, Oxbow, Porcupine Plain, Radville, Redvers, Rosetown, Shellbrook,
Spiritwood, Unity, Wadena, Wolseley, and Wynyard.
Out of these 65 positions, at the end of
March, 60 of them have already been filled. Again this is exactly
. . . You know, we go back to feedback from front-line health care
workers. Even just this week in the meetings I’ve had, you know, there’s a
desire to make sure that there’s more full-time positions available in rural
and northern communities.
So you know, this year’s budget
incremental amount of 4.9 million supports those 65 new enhanced
positions. It’s good news that we’ve already filled most of them. We have a few
more to fill. And this is on top of, you know . . . Because if you
remember back to when the health human resources action plan was started back
in 2022, these 65 positions are in addition to the 250 positions that we
converted from either casual or part-time or temporary to full-time positions.
And I’ll just say too that, you know,
the meetings I’ve been able to have with, you know, that I have on an ongoing
basis with the Saskatchewan Health Authority but also with our provider unions
and our nursing union partners as well, you know, we have some good discussions
about specific facilities where there might be opportunity to have a full-time
position. And this is exactly what we’re doing in this part of the budget.
[22:15]
Vicki Mowat: —
Are these RN [registered nurse] positions? What’s the designation of the
position here?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So the 65 talked about in this year’s budget, they’re all registered nurses or
registered nurse educators. Now out of the 250 positions that I referred to
over the last several years that have followed the same new and enhanced
categorization, not all of those were nursing positions. Some might have been
MRTs or CLXTs, [combined laboratory and X-ray technologist], so again a good
variety there.
The 65 positions here, as I mentioned,
these are all registered nursing positions really to stabilize about 30 rural
and northern locations. And just to break down further, 7 of the 65 were
enhanced from part-time to full-time, and then 58 were brand new positions and
new people added to the system. And again just to emphasize what I said
previously, 60 of the 65 positions are now filled.
Vicki Mowat: — I wonder if the
minister can speak to the nursing task force and why it seems that there’s no
budget allocation being assigned to the nursing task force.
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Well I guess I’ll just say on the nursing task force, we don’t know what’s
going to come out of the nursing task force. You know, looking forward to
. . . And that might be funny, but if you haven’t sat down with
everybody, how do you know what’s going to come out of it? And because if we’re
going to preclude the conclusion of it, what would be the point of engaging
with front-line health care workers?
So you know, I’ve been clear with all
the three providers and as well as the Saskatchewan Union of Nurses. My hope is
to sit down, talk about some of the operational challenges that they’re seeing,
help continue to reduce our reliance on contract nursing, and reduce the need
for excessive overtime for staff, and then just to really understand what are
the opportunities to enhance the recruitment incentives in place already and
understand again how we can better serve patients all around the province.
So you know, again looking forward to
all four of those partners engaging in the task force. Certainly as we move
forward with the task force and get a better understanding of what the
possibilities are and what the potential outcomes are, we can certainly have a
discussion if funding is necessary out of that.
Vicki Mowat: — Minister, in 2022
the Provincial Auditor looked at short-staffing in hard-to-recruit positions
and specifically had a recommendation to develop and implement a First Nations
and Métis recruitment and retention plan. I saw that there was a commitment from
the ministry as well in the HHR action plan in 2022 that “In 2022‑2023,
the SHA will work with partners to develop a First Nations and Métis
recruitment and retention strategy.” Can you update the committee on the status
of that?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So thanks for the question. I’ll just maybe update you, Ms. Mowat and the
committee, on some of the initiatives under way under the recruitment and
retention strategy.
You know, just first on retention.
Planning is currently under way for the establishment of a First Nations and
Métis employee resource network. And really that’s for internal staff already
to the SHA. And really the network will enable First Nations and Métis
employees to connect with each other and to guide, you know, guide mentorship
opportunities and career development opportunities within the SHA.
Indigenous workforce inclusion training
opportunities for leaders are currently in development and will be delivered in
this fiscal year. Really the training will focus on developing cultural
humility and learning culturally responsive leadership skills and approaches to
be implemented in their work with the SHA.
And you know, we’re also engaging
. . . I can say the SHA is engaging with our EFAP [employee family
assistance program], our employee family assistance provider to explore options
to really improve and increase access for Indigenous counsellors and culturally
responsive services for First Nations and Métis staff and their families.
On the recruitment side, obviously a big
way we do that is with, you know, engaging Indigenous communities at various
career fairs and recruitment events. I’ll actually provide a specific example
in a minute here. You know, the recruitment team continues to connect with high
school counsellors and Indigenous student advisors at post-secondary
institutions to provide opportunities for them to explore what a career in
health care could look like and helping them along the way in that regard.
You know, on the recruitment side I
mentioned I was going to provide a specific example, a recent, I think,
success. You know, some of the SHA teams attended the FSIN [Federation of
Sovereign Indigenous Nations] cultural celebration powwow in early November,
and last fall had a recruitment booth there alongside targeted recruitment for
specific positions around the province. You know, talked with over 100 folks
that came by the booth. We’ve had pre-screening interviews with about 20
potential candidates out of that effort, and you know, continuing to support
connecting them with their local hiring managers across the SHA.
And I’ll just say too, I’d say I’m
probably not the best to speak to this, but some of the good work that has been
going on in the post-secondary space, you know, certainly with our universities
and Sask Poly, but really in particular with some of our regional colleges
around the province. And some of the good work, I know, again, speaking
specifically about my local regional college in my community, a really strong
level of engagement from Indigenous communities in the area in terms of
accessing some of the programs available.
And I’ll just say too, you know, even
some of the work that has been going on with SIIT [Saskatchewan Indian
Institute of Technologies] and working with their leadership on finding
opportunities to develop specific programs to help us fill some of the gaps
that we have.
Vicki Mowat: — Thank you,
Minister. I understand there are significant vacancies in mental health and
addictions workers across the province. I’m wondering if we can get a breakdown
of what’s the province-wide percentage of vacant mental health and addictions
positions within the SHA as well as the percentage for Integrated Northern
Health and the percentage for the far North mental health and addictions
positions within the SHA. Again I’m looking for the percentage of vacant
positions.
[22:30]
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
So, Ms. Mowat, it’s a level of detail that we don’t have access here to
tonight. But just speaking with Andrew and Mike with the SHA, they’re going to
go back to their teams tomorrow and figure out kind of what data we can pull
together for you and share with you in as timely of a fashion as we can,
understanding it will take just a little bit of time to pull some of that
information together.
Vicki Mowat: — If I can have
another question? I don’t know what time we’re at. Okay. Go ahead.
Chair Weger:
— Having reached our agreed-upon time for consideration of these estimates, we
will now adjourn consideration of the estimates and supplementary estimates
no. 2 for the Ministry of Health. I’ll just take a moment to thank
legislative services staff, committee members, Minister Cockrill, Minister
Carr, and all of the ministry officials for again another long night here. And,
Minister, do you have any closing comments?
Hon. Jeremy
Cockrill: —
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I would just echo some of your comments in terms of
thanking Hansard and the Legislative Assembly Service staff for shepherding us
through these proceedings. Thank you to Ms. Mowat and your team for your
thoughtful and respectful questions tonight. And just again finally a thank you
to the officials who have joined us tonight. Thank you for your important work
that you do on behalf of the government in terms of delivering better access to
patient care every single day. And sure appreciate their work.
And then again, you know, we’ve talked
about them at different times throughout the night, but many of the folks that
work in our health care system across the province on the front line, sure
appreciate their efforts each and every day as well, as they serve our friends
and families. So thank you, Mr. Chair.
Chair Weger:
— Ms. Mowat, do you have any comments?
Vicki Mowat: — Yes, thank you,
Mr. Chair. I want to echo the minister’s words of thanks and say that, you
know, I certainly appreciate how many hours go into preparations for these
committees. And recognizing the fact that we’re coming to the end of our Health
estimates time, appreciate everyone who has spent a couple of nights here doing
this work and bringing forward answers on behalf of the people of the province.
So thanks for all of the work that all of you do day to day as well.
Chair Weger:
— This committee stands adjourned until Wednesday, April 2nd, 2025 at 5 p.m.
[The committee adjourned at 22:33.]
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