News

Ontario Health Minister George Smitherman said the government will not consider contracting out knee-replacement operations to a private Toronto hospital.

The Globe and Mail revealed yesterday that the province was reviewing a proposal from Don Mills Surgical Unit Ltd., a private Toronto hospital, to perform 1,500 knee-replacement operations.

Late Wednesday afternoon, Health Ministry spokesman A. G. Klei said in an interview that the proposal was under review. But by early yesterday, Mr. Smitherman said at a press conference that he would not support it.

"This Ministry of Health gives you and all Ontarians the complete assurance, I will never support the outsourcing of those knee surgeries to any private, for-profit-motivated organization," Mr. Smitherman said. "Our government fundamentally believes that the public health-care system, the not-for-profit public health-care system is the best expression of Canadian values."

He later added: "We would not be supporting such a proposal with all certainty, I offer."

The news comes as the Ontario government works feverishly to reduce some of the lengthier queues for joint replacements.

Although progress has been made -- waits for knee replacement, for example, have dropped by 18.9 per cent or 83 days since August/September, 2005 -- queues remain long.

Specifically, 90 per cent of patients requiring knee replacements had them done in just under a year, within 357 days, according to Ontario figures for October and November of 2006.

Under the proposal, the 20-bed hospital with two operating rooms would provide a form of one-stop shopping for patients, in what is becoming part of a growing trend of boutique surgical centres across Canada.

Patients would stay at the North Toronto hospital to undergo surgery and do physiotherapy.

The moneyed would not be able to jump the queue, and patients wouldn't notice any difference from the public hospital system, Brenda Rasmussen, chief executive officer of Alegro Health Corp., parent of Don Mills Surgical, has said.