Fraser Health continues to await word from the provincial government about its expansion plans. In 2010, Fraser Health submitted a concept expansion and renovation plan to the province that would help address the demand for space at Royal Columbian Hospital.
"We are still waiting for approval to proceed with more detailed plans," said Fraser Health spokesperson Roy Thorpe-Dorward.
Once the concept plan is approved, Thorpe-Dorward said Fraser Health would begin work on detailed plans. "What we are awaiting is approval to proceed to detailed planning and funding for that."
New Westminster MLA Dawn Black recently spoke at length about the need for funding to expand Royal Columbian Hospital in the provincial legislature. Her comments came as part of her speech on the 2012 provincial budget.
"There is nothing in here for Royal Columbian Hospital, and I find this shocking," she said. "I remind the premier in this house that Royal Columbian is the tertiary care hospital for Fraser Heath's more than 1.6 million residents. That's one-third of the B.C. population. Royal Columbian is a tertiary care facility for all of those people. Royal Columbian Hospital treats one in three people in this province."
According to Black, the other 11 acute care hospitals in Fraser Health transfer their sickest patients to Royal Columbian Hospital when they need to be treated for specialties such as trauma and cardiac services.
"The other issue at Royal Columbian is the issue of the Sherbrooke building at Royal Columbian. This is the building that serves mental health care, addiction services," she said. "It's old, it's antiquated, it's unsafe and it doesn't have the space to address the privacy concerns of patients."
Black said the hospital's staff does a wonderful job but they're operating in a building that needs to be demolished. She said the space is below standard and isn't seismically safe.
"That leads me to what is happening at Fraser Health on the expansion that has been promised for Royal Columbian Hospital. They have been working for several years with the ministry of health on a concept plan for the renovation and expansion. The property has been put together with the cooperation of the city," she said. "Everything is in place, except that the concept plan that was delivered to this government in 2010 has not moved forward."
Black said she's been told it generally takes six to eight months for a concept plan to be approved.
"The concept plan has sat with the minister of health now for almost two years without a word coming back," she said. "I think people in Fraser Health have a lot to be concerned about with the well-needed expansion of the hospital."
