TIMMINS -- With hospitals limiting operations to only emergency services and surgeries, the demand for non-essential services and elective surgeries is rising.

Blaise MacNeil, CEO of the Timmins and District Hospital, said medical staff have a growing waiting list of procedures they need to schedule once the province allows them to happen again.

But before then, MacNeil said the checklist of equipment and scheduling challenges health workers need to address is a strenuous one.

“We have to have a stable supply of personal protective equipment,” MacNeil said in a Zoom interview. “Then we have to have a plan for allowing each of our individual physicians adequate operating room time.”

Balancing healthcare with COVID

That’s just one aspect to consider, MacNeil said. Another concern is accommodating the increased number of patients while maintaining physical distancing.

Among all the guidance documents received from the federal and provincial governments, MacNeil is still waiting for advice on that front.

“How we would approach allowing people to come to clinics and people to come for radiology services ... and have them wait in a responsible way?”

Despite the disruption of COVID-19, MacNeil said capacity at the hospital is stable. He estimates the numbers of patients visiting its emergency room dropped to around 40 per cent of pre-pandemic levels.

Similar to other major health events such as SARS, MacNeil said people are being more mindful about visiting the hospital unless absolutely necessary.

Adjusting to a ‘new normal’

That said, MacNeil stressed non-urgent medical needs can develop into more serious issues, and that staff are prepared for those situations.

But once the province lifts current restrictions, he said the hospital will still operate at a limited capacity.

“We won’t be doing the same number of procedures a day that we would have done in a pre-COVID environment,” MacNeil said. “We have to recognize that it’s not going to be business as usual for quite some time.”

Before resuming non-urgent services, MacNeil said the hospital needs to get the OK from the Porcupine Health Unit, a regional steering committee — and the green-light from the province.

But the only way to return to life as it was before the virus, MacNeil said, is to have a working, government-approved, vaccine distributed the public.

Working on the frontlines

Until then, healthcare workers on the frontlines are adjusting to a new workload.

In an earlier interview, Timmins physician Dr. Julie Samson told CTV about her experience working in the hospital’s emergency ward during the pandemic.

“It’s been very difficult and emotionally straining,” Samson said. “We can’t let our guard down, we have to protect ourselves every time now.”

Since the start of the crisis, Samson said staff, nurses, respiratory technicians and emergency physicians have all supported each other.

But she said dealing with an outbreak at the hospital, which has since cleared, only added to the stress -- and the requirement to assume everyone around you has COVID-19.

“We’re all worried about taking this home but we want to help the patients. So it’s balancing that together."