Nova Scotia Wait Times banner


Go directly to Wait Times Data
 

The wait times provided here are for scheduled tests, treatments and services only.

Federal & Provincial Benchmarks



Each year, the Nova Scotia Department of Health allocates funding in areas that reflects Nova Scotians’ health care needs and priorities.

We spend approximately over $2 billion, or 46 per cent of the provincial budget, on the delivery of quality health care to Nova Scotians.

The Department of Health works closely with the province’s nine district health authorities, IWK Health Centre, and other health partners to improve health care services and identify, address, and reduce wait times throughout the health system.

In 2004, the First Ministers agreed on a 10-year-plan to strengthen health care in Canada. Our plan in Nova Scotia includes providing updates on the progress we are making to improve access as well as the challenges we must still address when it comes to wait times. See our Strategy (PDF: 39k)...

Making Inroads on Wait Times

It is our goal to see that every Nova Scotia receives timely access to care. To that end, we have made significant strides this year to address wait times issues across the health system.

The Right Equipment

We the help of the federal government, we have invested $90 million in new equipment in the last five years.

  • We are opening a PET scanner in Halifax, have added state-of the-art 64 slice CTs scanners in most of our major hospitals and added three bone density machines..
  • We've opened six new MRIs across the province and cut the wait time in half, helping 5,000 people get that test faster.
  • Nova Scotians can access faster care themselves by using our public web site to see where MRI, CT scans, ultrasounds, and other screening services are available sooner www.gov.ns.ca/health/waittimes.

At 58%, Nova Scotia now has the highest participation rate in the country of women getting mammograms, but we’re not stopping there. Nova Scotia just became the first place in North America to open a mobile digital mammography unit, that allows us to double the number of women seen everyday for breast screening. This is in addition to a new digital unit at the Cobequid Community Health Centre in Lower Sackville and Yarmouth.

The Right Services

In March we secured $48 million in wait time money from the federal government to address wait times, including establishing a wait time guarantee that we are working on for cancer radiation therapy.

We are opening brand new chronic pain clinics this fall to address the long wait times faced by these patients.

We started work on a new $17 million Emergency Room expansion for Capital Health so that our whole province can continue to have the best trauma centre in the East. And we started construction in Truro where we are building a new hospital, with an expanded ER.

In addition to the 832 new nursing home beds that will be opened by 2010, we are taking immediate steps to help those waiting now in hospital or at home. We opened over 120 temporary hospital and nursing home beds across the province in the past few months, and have committed an additional $3.6 million to districts to allow them to develop or expand services to help patients waiting for long-term care beds.

We are creating a $3 million colorectal cancer screening program to help encourage early detection of this disease.


The Right People

Every year (CIHI) Canadian Institute for Health Information shows we have more GPs per capita than almost every other province. Since January 2007, we have hired 55 more doctors - 31 family physicians, and 24 specialists. Of those 54 doctors, 31 were recruited to rural areas.

The Department of Health took part in Opportunities Nova Scotia, a Provincial initiative to better connect Nova Scotia employers and job seekers. In early November the department traveled to Toronto, Mississauga, Ottawa, Edmonton and Calgary to repatriate and recruit physicians, nurses, and other health-care professionals to the province www.healthteamnovascotia.ca.

While our Emergency Rooms are open 99 per cent of the time, we know that even being closed for short periods creates real challenges for communities. So we are working hard to keep our ERs open. We’re now hiring two Nurse Practitioners in Digby, and a new ER doctor.

We truly value our nurses and have spent $60 million in the last five years to help recruit and retain them. And it’s working. Over 85 per cent of our graduates are employed right here at home in Nova Scotia. By December 2007, we will graduate another 300 new nurses. We know that at least 200 have already been offered jobs here, and that districts will likely make more offers to these students over the next couple of months.

Benchmarks for Health Services (Provincial Press Release - December 12, 2005)