Doctor to monitor Health Links calls

Doctor to monitor calls

The Manitoba government announced it has added a new doctor to monitor calls made to Health Links–Info Santé to try to reduce unnecessary referrals to the emergency room, a news release said on Thursday.

Manitobans can call the nurse-managed bilingual telephone program for assessment, triage and health advice. Depending on a patient’s needs, nurses may refer people to contact their family physician, a walk-in clinic or direct them to an emergency room or urgent care centre.

Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara said a doctor was added to the program earlier this month and is available to speak to from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Another clinician is expected to join the program in late December and work overnight hours, the release said.

Nurse practitioners will also be added in the long term.

The minister said many Manitobans have had the experience of calling Health Links only to be told to go wait for hours in an emergency room. Adding doctors to the service can help reduce pressure in the health-care system, Asagwara said.

Health Links–Info Santé receives on average of 400 calls per day. Of those calls, an average of 40 patients are triaged to emergency departments every day, the release said. In the first 10 days of adding the doctor to the service, 160 patients were transferred to speak with the physician and only 10 of those patients were triaged to an emergency room.

New bursary announced

The Manitoba government has created a new $5,000 bursary program for emergency medical responder students, according to a news release on Wednesday.

Students who receive the bursary will enter a one-year return-of-service-agreement once they are hired, which will require them to work in rural Manitoba.

The province is offering financial help to make enrolling in a course more appealing, Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara said in the release.

“We’re putting trainees in rural municipalities, where they can get hands-on experience on real-world emergency calls and fall in love with rural Manitoba,” the minister said.

By the fall of 2026, approximately 50 to 60 emergency medical responder students are expected to graduate, complete the Canadian Organization of Paramedic Regulators exam and be eligible for hiring into provincial emergency medical services, Asagwara said.

Emergency medical responders can play an important role in supporting emergency medical services, but they don’t have the training to respond to emergency medical calls, Jason Linklater said in a statement, who is the president of the Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals.

Many time-sensitive or high-acuity calls such as cardiac arrests, severe trauma, violent or unstable patients and obstetrical emergencies, require simultaneous interventions by two fully trained paramedics, he said.

Emergency medical responders “limited scope of practice does not allow them to provide anywhere near the same level of care that paramedics can,” Linklater said.

The NDP has added 18 of the 200 paramedics it promised to add since being elected in 2023, he said.

» The Brandon Sun