Elective surgeries on hold due to the COVID-19 pandemic are still weeks away from resuming, according to Windsor Regional Hospital President and CEO David Musyj
The provincial government released its framework to get elective surgeries back on track amid pandemic on Thursday. According to The Ministry of Health, timelines will vary from hospital to hospital and be conditional on approval by regional oversight tables.
Musyj sat on the committee that created the framework and says the first step is making sure everyone is on the same page.
"Once the local hospital plans are completed, there will be regional committee made up of all the hospital representatives who will review each other's plans to make sure they're consistent with each other," he says.
The last thing the hospital wants is to see a second wave of the virus in the community, according to Musyj.
"We're not out of the woods yet. As a result we have to proceed cautiously, but at the same time, start dealing with those surgeries that have been postponed and to try to get those done in incremental fashion," he says.
Musyj says the region managed to avoid the huge surge of cases seen elsewhere in the world and they want to keep it that way.
"We got to the point where we're at now that we can even have this discussion, but what we have to do is make sure that we don't undo all the good that we did as a region and rush into this and create a second wave ourselves," he added.
Musyj says the planning process will take several weeks, so he's asking everyone to be patient and wait for their doctor's office to reach out to reschedule.
All emergency procedures and services have continued throughout the pandemic, according to Musyj.