Toronto ER Doctor Calls Patient Volumes “out of control” as Waits Near Seven Hours at Some Hospitals

Dr. Raghu Venugopal, an emergency room physician who works at three Toronto hospitals, has warned that patient volumes at some of the city's emergency departments are “out of control,” calling the situation “demoralizing.” On Thursday morning (November 12), the wait at Toronto General Hospital approached seven hours, and some patients waited 10 hours just to see a doctor. (Photo: an emergency department waiting area, file photo.)

Waits above five hours at several hospitals on Thursday morning

According to data published by the hospitals, at around 9 a.m. on Thursday the wait to see a doctor was nearly seven hours at Toronto General Hospital, five hours and 42 minutes at Toronto Western Hospital and three hours and 47 minutes at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre. By 3 p.m., Sunnybrook's wait had risen to six hours and 55 minutes, while Toronto General and Toronto Western were sitting at around three-and-a-half hours. North York General Hospital posted an alert on its website on Thursday afternoon saying it was seeing a high volume of patients in the ER and to expect longer-than-normal wait times.

Doctor: too few staff and beds, and hospitals are full

Venugopal, who has worked in emergency rooms for 19 years, said patients routinely wait four, seven or eight hours. “In Toronto, we have patients waiting 10 hours, and that's just to see the doctor,” he said. The problem, he said, is that “we just don't have enough doctors, we don't have enough support services like radiology, we don't have enough nurses and we don't have enough beds,” adding that “our hospitals are full.” Official data published by the Ontario Ministry of Health puts the average wait to see an ER doctor in the province over the past year at 1.7 to two hours, well below Thursday's waits at individual Toronto hospitals. (Sources: The Canadian Press; Toronto hospitals' published wait times.)