When Canada’s health-care system works, it works really well

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“I hate this bed!” the nurse exclaimed as she unsuccessfully attempted to right the listing ship that was my home for an all-expenses-paid, four-day-and-three-night stay at The Ottawa Hospital in January.

One corner at the foot of my bed was lower than the other, and so, as I lacked the necessary strength in my quads, adductors and other muscles to prevent it, my right leg, sometimes accompanied by the left, would drift along on gravity until it was partially hanging off the edge. For someone in the earliest days of trying out a new pair of hips, it didn’t seem ideal, but perhaps was still within the realm of first-world problems, like the poorly designed washroom in my shared hospital room that required patients to shimmy in sideways with our walkers in order to do our business. At least we had a washroom, I reminded myself.

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Oh, and I almost forgot — there was the brief delay to my surgery caused by a boiler at the hospital that went on the fritz, requiring a repairman to come and fix it so there would be hot water. I confess that that did feel like a third-world problem.

Yet I don’t wish to seem overly critical or ungrateful. Because honestly, I am extremely and sincerely grateful. I know how lucky I am.

I’m lucky that while, like so many Ontarians, I no longer have a family physician, I do have a specialist whom I see annually for an unrelated issue, who recognized my “crunchy” hips (his description) long before I did, and steered me along the right path.

And I’m grateful that Canadians can get this and many other procedures without having to sell our houses or our first-born children. Admittedly, it took a good while before my name was added to the hip-replacement waiting list — a process slowed by COVID-19 — but once I was there, the delay of about five months didn’t seem unduly long. Most significantly, although I am still recovering and long, unaided walks still remain a thing of the future, I no longer experience the pain that was previously an everyday part of my life.

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I’m not naïve, however. Ontario’s health-care system has worsened under successive governments. Funding has not kept up with the needs of an aging population. Hospitals are understaffed, their employees overworked, underpaid and stressed. Shortages of doctors and nurses have increased wait times, cancelled procedures and caused unplanned emergency department closures, as well as off-load ambulance delays that keep paramedics from doing their jobs.

There are plenty of horror stories reminding us of how the system fails the public. As I convalesced at home, I read The Fall, my colleague Elizabeth Payne’s gripping account of the experience of her 90-year-old father, Allan, in the health-care system, where the broken arm he suffered in a fall precipitated a cascade of systemic failures that resulted in his death. Liz’s story was all the more harrowing not because Allan’s journey seemed so improbable, which it should have been, but rather because it felt like a preventable yet too-common occurrence.

It was after reading The Fall that I decided to write about my experience via my double-hip replacement. I’d recently had the staples removed — more than 60 of them — and the whole process on that day, which included 1) having the staples removed; 2) having the surgeon check the incisions before they were dressed; 3) having the incisions dressed; 4) getting new x-rays; 5) a consultation with the surgeon after he saw the x-rays; and 6) briefly seeing a physiotherapist, had me in and out of the hospital in just one hour. It was a display of efficiency that caught me by surprise, but one which, in retrospect, pretty fairly describes the treatment I experienced throughout.

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My decision to write about it is not an attempt to discount stories like the one Liz told. Her narrative, and others like it, are desperately important to shine light on the unacceptable shortcomings of our health-care system, while holding officials to account.

But by the same token, it’s important to acknowledge that when the system works, it does so remarkably well, and we ought to recognize that. Four years ago, we stood outside our homes at dusk, banging pots and pans to show our support for frontline workers who were enduring remarkable circumstances. Today, circumstances are just as dire, but we rarely acknowledge their efforts and successes.

So thank you to the admitting nurse, Jen, who stayed and talked with me while the hot water was being fixed. And thank you to the surgeon, Dr. Feibel, whose pre- and post-op humour and humanity were always much appreciated (not to mention his and his team’s surgical proficiency). And to physiotherapists Seeba, Fanny and Phiona, whose encouragements successfully smoothed my frustration, and to the nurses, orderlies and technicians who treated me like a person first, another big thank-you. I’d certainly recommend the place to my friends.

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But can you get the man who fixed the boiler to do something about that bed?

Born in Fort William, Ont., a city that no longer appears on maps, Bruce Deachman has called Ottawa home for most of his life. As a columnist and reporter with the Citizen, he works at keeping Ottawa on the map. You can reach him at bdeachman@postmedia.com.

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