Merritt couple frustrated over operating room closure at RIH

The reason for the postponement stems from an air exchange fan malfunctioning in the operating room area. Susan Duncan is a communications consultant with Interior Health, and says the issue forced the closure of five operating rooms in the hospital. Duncan says the rooms will be up and running again in full capacity come Monday.

“We postponed an average of 12 surgeries each day due to this issue. For context, between 35 and 45 surgical procedures take place every day at Royal Inland so many surgeries still went ahead,” she says. “Cancer and urgent surgeries took place in the operating rooms not impacted by the air exchange issue.”

Although Nicole’s surgery wasn’t a matter of life or death, Michael says there should be an emergency back up system in place for when things go wrong in a hospital.

“I really believe that Interior Health has a duty to the people of BC, especially within the Thompson-Nicola region to make sure that all medical facilities and services are running at 100 per cent,” Michael says. “I really believe that there should be an emergency back-up system for fan ventilation in the operating room. I don’t understand why there isn’t some type of back-up there. It’s not just my wife — there’s several, several other people, we’re talking a dozen other people, waiting for operations right now who have to travel from out of town… There’s time and loss.”

Duncan says IH apologizes to all of those impacted, but the decision to close the rooms wasn’t made lightly.

“We recognize this is an inconvenience and any delays are frustrating. This decision was made with their safety as the top priority. Those procedures will be rebooked as soon as possible and based on the urgency in each case.”

As for the Beauclairs, they want to see changes.

“She wants to see some action, she wants to see some accountability with this,” Michael says.

by Ashley Legassic

Merritt couple frustrated over operating room closure at RIH

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