Charlottetown cataract clinic to resume surgeries in April after March cancellations

Cataract surgeries at Charlottetown’s outpatient clinic are expected to resume in April, after procedures scheduled for March were cancelled due to the clinic reaching its annual funding target earlier than expected.

At a town hall event Monday night, Health and Wellness Minister Cory Deagle confirmed the private clinic has cancelled all of its appointments for this month because it has run out of funding.

“We had an agreement with Health P.E.I. to perform 3,600 cataracts within the fiscal year, April 1 to March 31, and … basically we achieved that by March 2,” Guy Boswall, medical director of the P.E.I. Vision Surgical Centre, told CBC News on Wednesday.

“We've done the number of cataract surgeries that they wanted us to do.”

Boswall confirmed that no surgeries have been performed since March 2, and all appointments for the rest of the month were cancelled.

“Very likely they will all be done sometime in April; they'll certainly be done on a priority basis,” he said, adding that patients whose appointments were cancelled will not lose their place in line.

“I would be surprised if they're not all done by the end of April.”

Boswall said the clinic is planning to resume operations April 1 when new funding becomes available at the start of the fiscal year.

The Charlottetown clinic is privately operated but funded by the provincial government. It's the only cataract surgery centre on Prince Edward Island, Boswall said, with more complex cases requiring sedation or general anesthesia handled at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

Boswall said discussions were held last month about continuing surgeries beyond the 3,600-procedure cap.

As the clinic approached its annual target, Boswall met with Health P.E.I.’s chief operating officer, Chris Nickerson, in February to talk about extending operations through the rest of March.

But doing so would have required approval from the P.E.I. Treasury Board, which ultimately did not happen in time, he said.

“One of the things we certainly agreed upon was that next year we need to meet much earlier,” Boswall said.

“I'll make sure that happens next year and we'll assess the situation at that time and together decide whether or not we should continue above and beyond the 3,600.”