Over the next few months, Northern Haida Gwaii (Masset) will experience a significant physician shortage, resulting in service interruptions and reduced local medical coverage. As a result, the physicians based in Daajing Giids (Southern Haida Gwaii) will occasionally be required to provide medical support for patients across the entire island.

This situation means that health care providers at both Northern and Southern Haida Gwaii Hospitals will be facing increased workload and pressure, with Daajing Giids physicians stepping in to cover additional emergency and inpatient needs. Despite our best efforts to maintain essential services, there will be unavoidable impacts to patient access and service levels.

Please be prepared for the following changes:

1. Longer wait times for routine medical appointments.
2. Delays and potential temporary closures of the Emergency Department in Masset.
3. Clinic schedule changes at short notice, as physicians are redeployed to ensure emergency coverage.
4. Prescription refills may take longer – please request renewals at least two weeks in advance.
5. Increased reliance on allied health providers (nurses, pharmacists, and the 811 HealthLink line) for non-urgent care and advice. Virtual and after-hours supports are listed below.

The strength of Haida Gwaii lies in how our communities come together during challenging times. We deeply appreciate your patience and understanding as we navigate this difficult period. Your continued support will help us focus on solutions that strengthen recruitment, retention, and long-term stability of health care on the island.

– The Physicians of Haida Gwaii

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One of the booths at this year's Hospital Day highlighted the good news that, if we are successful at securing funding, we may soon have a CT scanner on Haida Gwaii. Some of our local physicians were available to answer questions and share information. Over 100 people come by, many of whom offered to donate! 

​Highlighting again the need for a CT scanner, on the Hospital Day weekend alone, we had 5 people presenting to the island's hospitals who needed CT imaging in order to confirm, diagnose or manage their acute medical condition. All had to consider traveling off island to access this imaging. It is clear that having this essential diagnostic equipment on Haida Gwaii would improve the quality of care accessible to islanders.

We are asking those interested in making a donation to please contact the Hospital Day Society, indicating that you wish to contribute towards the CT project. 

Please spread the message to your friends and neighbours! ​

​This spring, Northern Health gave the green light for a CT scanner to be installed and operated on Haida Gwaii. By far, more than any other technology, access to local CT can improve Islanders’ health and wellbeing by allowing for time-sensitive critical diagnoses, improving the management of a wide array of health conditions. We all know friends, family and neighbours who have presented to one of our hospitals with a serious medical issue and have had to wait hours or days to get transported to Prince Rupert for a CT. Nearly all of us will require a CT scan at some point in our life, and every year, 1 in 8 of us get a CT. 

How will a CT help? 

1. Faster diagnosis - annually, 250 people are transferred from our emergency departments to Prince Rupert for an urgent CT scan. Patients with conditions like strokes, brain bleeding, abdominal pain and trauma experience delays while awaiting transfer. Once scanned, patients with significant findings often require another transfer to a larger hospital for time sensitive and potentially life-saving procedures. A scanner here means we can treat locally or transfer to higher level care more quickly. 

2. Stroke care – modern stroke care requires a CT to ensure safe use of medications that can open the blockages jn circulation that cause the stroke. People who have a stroke on Haida Gwaii receive worse care and experience greater brain damage because we don’t have a CT. 

3. Reductions in unnecessary patient transfers – about 40% of transfers can be avoided if we can rule out serious conditions locally. 

4. Air Ambulance access improvement - With less need for CT-related transfers, Haida Gwaii patients will experience faster transfers to the right location. 

5. Patient confidence and trust – CT takes much of the guesswork out of making a diagnosis. Both patients and providers can focus on appropriate treatment and not stress over when a transfer will occur. 

6. Better cancer care – CT is part of the cancer journey, from diagnosis to treatment. Most cancers require investigation with CT. Planning for biopsies and surgery requires CT for determining the extent of cancer. People with cancer can receive most of their treatments locally through Haida Gwaii Cancer Care. Many patients need CT to ensure treatments are working. A local CT means people will have their cancers diagnosed earlier and treated effectively without having to travel by ferry. 

7. Health care provider retention – we need to be competitive in attracting and retaining health care professionals. Physicians are trained in an environment with CT availability. The new generation of physicians expect to have the right tools to work effectively on Haida Gwaii and not struggle with transfers and an incomplete picture of why their patients are sick. Many residents and physicians express to us that they would not work on Haida Gwaii because of the lack of CT. 

Unfortunately, Northern Health has no dollars to install a CT on island, with estimates ranging from $6 to $10 million for the purchase and retrofitting of the scanner into one of our hospitals. It is up to the islands to fund raise for the CT, and it will require all our efforts to do so. With Northern Health’s offer to operate a CT indefinitely, including future replacements once installed, this one-time purchase would benefit all of us now, and for future generations. 

We have approached the Gwaii Trust, the CHN, communities and Band Councils, and now we are reaching out to the islanders directly to enlist support and advice on how we can fund this project. Stay tuned for updates on this opportunity. 

- Haida Gwaii Medical Staff

We are so excited to share with you, our communities, the Pathway to Perinatal Care on Haida Gwaii.

The pathway is a visual representation of many of the possible options available to residents of Haida Gwaii from pre-pregnancy and beyond. It was designed to guide you to find resources and to discover your options for support along your own unique pathway.

The pathway can be broken down into sections:

1. Pre-pregnancy options, like birth control or pregnancy planning support.
2. Newly pregnant options, like what to do when you’re pregnant and don’t want to be, what happens and who can support you during a miscarriage, and who is available to care for you when you choose to continue your pregnancy.
3.  Pregnancy/birth/early weeks with baby options, like what community resources are available, options for where do give birth, and resources to support you after your baby is born.

The pathway includes a QR code on the bottom right-hand corner that links you to the contact info for the resources shared on the pathway. You can also access the resources by following this LINK.

If you have any resources you’d like added to the contact information page, send an email to:  [email protected]

If you’re interested in displaying the pathway at your place of work, please contact us by commenting on this blog post and we’d be happy to send you some copies.

Haawa to Kara Sievewright (makerofnets.ca) for another beautiful offering for our communities!

Have you or has someone you love been diagnosed with cancer?

We know that it can be difficult for people within our community to access care following a cancer diagnosis. If you or someone you love needs to travel to receive cancer care, you may be able to access support through the Cancer Travel and Accommodation Services (CTAAS) program.

The CTAAS program, delivered in partnership by the Canadian Cancer Society and Hope Air, is dedicated to reducing the financial burden people face when they need to travel to receive cancer care. Depending on your income level, you may qualify for free air travel, travel grants and/or accommodation support.

To learn more, please call the Canadian Cancer Society at 1-888-939-3333 or visit the CTAAS website.

We would like to share what information we have about possible changes in health care on Haida Gwaii, and how we are working together to respond. 

The staffing shortages affecting clinics and hospitals across the country have come to Haida Gwaii. The ongoing toll of COVID, an aging population (and workforce) and increasing complexity of care has placed huge stress on existing staff and has made replacing departing staff very difficult. As with every other health care facility in Canada, there is increasing reliance on a limited supply of temporary workers such as travel nurses.  

Staff shortages are most acute at the Northern Haida Gwaii Hospital (NHGH), in Gaw (Masset). Northern Health’s local and regional administrators, nurses, and physicians are working together on ways to provide the best possible care under various staffing scenarios. We are working to get the exact details right and share them as soon as possible. 
It is likely that the NHGH will be unable to admit patients to hospital for periods of time. This would result in patients being transferred to the Haida Gwaii Hospital in Daajing Giids or off island.  If there is an even greater staff shortage, NHGH may have to close its emergency room overnight. The priority will be to continue to have on-call nurses and physicians that can help ambulance to stabilize critical patients locally before they are transfered out of community. There may also be longer wait times for an ambulance as we anticipate more transfers between hospitals.  

What can you do? 
First, please use after-hours emergency services only for truly urgent issues that cannot wait until morning. Each hospital has the most staff during daytime hours and there will be additional access then for those needing to be seen urgently. 

The Northern Health Virtual Clinic also provides access to a family doctor or nurse practitioner between the hours of 10am to 10pm, and can be reached at 1-844-645-7811.  
https://www.northernhealth.ca/locations/medical-clinics/virtual-clinic

The First Nations Virtual Doctor of the Day enables First Nations people to access a doctor 7-days a week, from 8:30am to 4:30pm. This service can be reached at 1-855-344-3800.  
https://www.fnha.ca/what-we-do/ehealth/virtual-doctor-of-the-day

You can also call 811 to speak with a nurse is available 24/7 to offer advice for any health problem, and to help you decide how urgent your issue may be.
https://www.healthlinkbc.ca/health-services/healthlink-bc-811-services

Finally, we urge the public to be patient and kind. We are all feeling the stresses of the situation. Let’s focus our collective energies towards initiatives that will help us recruit and retain health care providers and strengthen our communal safety net. We need your help.

– The Physicians of Haida Gwaii

These pictures were taken a few days before we moved from the old Queen Charlotte Islands General Hospital to the new Xaayda Gwaay Ngaaysdll Naay (Haida Gwaii Hospital).  Not long after this, the old hospital was torn down and paved over, to put up the new parking lot.