BCHS to ramp down scheduled care to protect hospital capacity

Brantford, ON – The Chief Medical Officer of Health has reinstated Directive #2 for hospitals and regulated health professionals, instructing hospitals to pause all non-emergent and non-urgent surgeries and procedures in order to preserve critical care and human resource capacity. As a result, effective today, Brant Community Healthcare System (BCHS) is ramping down all elective surgeries and non-emergent/non-urgent hospital activities.

“Increasing daily case counts and widespread community transmission of the Omicron variant have placed extreme pressure on hospital bedded capacity”, said Dr. David McNeil, President & CEO of BCHS. “We must do everything possible to meet the needs of our community during this challenging wave.”

Dr. McNeil added postponing surgeries will impact patients, their families and caregivers.

“To those people affected by the surgery postponement, we are very sorry for this inconvenience and the unfortunate circumstances everyone is facing. We are grateful to our patients and local communities for doing their part to stay safe and stop the spread of COVID-19.”

BCHS will continue to support all urgent and emergent care and high priority oncology cases.

Patients who are impacted by the surgical ramp down will be contacted by their care provider and surgeries will be rescheduled.

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