LaGrange and Mentzelopoulos are also expected to face questions about the treatment of a 62-year-old patient who was moved from the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton to a TraveLodge motel in Leduc
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Alberta Health Minister Adriana LaGrange says the government is putting off rollout of a new health-care governing organization that was expected in the spring.
It’s part of a massive reorganization that will see the provincial health authority, Alberta Health Services (AHS) stripped of most of its duties beyond acute care and continuing care.
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At an announcement Thursday morning in Edmonton, LaGrange said the new continuing care organization will be created in the fall along with other new governing agencies for primary care, acute care, and a ministry-led integration council.
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The mental health and addiction organization is still expected to be introduced in the spring as planned.
LaGrange said that with new regulations for continuing care taking effect April 1, the government wants to further engage with continuing-care operators.
“They want to have time with the new regulations,” she said, adding that rolling out three organizations at once will ensure they have “good integration.”
“It really is going to happen in the fall because of what we’ve heard, and we committed to that all along — that we would be flexible.”
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LaGrange said she plans to introduce legislation in the spring sitting of the legislature to change the Regional Health Authorities Act.
The health minister said the UCP’s plan to re-haul the health-care system has so far been one of the “largest” public consultations in the province’s history. The government is adding 22 more engagement sessions as part of a series of 65 set to run until mid-April.
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LaGrange said so far, the government has heard about the need for system integration, more local decision-making, and more health-care workers.
Opposition NDP critic for continuing care Lori Sigurdson told reporters in the legislature later Thursday that it’s good to have consultation, but the province needs to take more action in creating thousands of new beds and better recruiting health care workers.
“They’re missing the boat. It seems like it’s another delay. Albertans are suffering, they’re not getting the supports they need, so I think it’s a bad idea,” she said.
Also on Thursday, the government announced that Premier Danielle Smith appointed Chelsae Petrovic, MLA for Livingstone-Macleod, as parliamentary secretary for health workforce engagement to support the reorganization.
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