Angioplasty: our community’s most urgent need
Windsor-Essex is a cardiac hotspot. Our cardiac health is the second worst in Canada and cardiac disease is now the leading cause of death in women.
And yet, our local healthcare team lacks the necessary resources to deal with the problem head on. It’s not a matter of know-how or dedication; our team simply doesn’t have the facilities it needs to offer the life-saving help it’s trained to provide.
At the root of the problem is this fact: Windsor-Essex has only one angioplasty lab, which seriously limits our ability to treat all the area’s cardiac patients. We are, in fact, Ontario’s only angioplasty centre using a single lab.
The strain is doubly acute when emergency interventions are called for. Last year, for instance, our cardiac interventionalist was able to perform 433 angioplasty procedures. Unfortunately, over 500 patients had to be transferred elsewhere for exactly the same treatment, of which 100 required transfer to Detroit on an emergency basis.
A terrible toll
The emotional and financial toll on these patients and their families is unacceptable. The ambulance costs alone amount to almost $1 million each year; and we spend millions more funding out-of-town procedures. And yet the solution – building a second lab – seems as achievable as it is necessary to the health of our community.
Hôtel-Dieu Grace has embraced that urgent challenge. Our 10,445 square foot Cardiac Care Centre will feature two state-of-the-art angioplasty suites that will allow us to treat all of the area’s cardiac patients –especially those in need of emergency procedures – in a timely way. Indeed, patients whose angiograms reveal the need for intervention through angioplasty will receive their procedure the same day. Having the dual suite here in Windsor-Essex will halt the transfer of local patients to out-of-town facilities. Most importantly, it will allow us to attract additional life-saving heart specialists to our area. Our cardiac patients – among Canada’s most in need of critical care – require access to this life-saving treatment right now. It’s our chance –indeed our obligation – as a community to step up and say we deserve better.
To make your donation to this, our community’s greatest healthcare need click here, or contact the Hôtel-Dieu Grace Hospital Foundation office at 519-973-4443.