Organ donation program resumes, but only partially: Saskatchewan Health Authority
Global News
The organ donation program was halted as the COVID-19 response taxed health care resources. Now, staffing vacancies in Saskatoon are preventing full program resumption.
The Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) has confirmed its organ donation program is back online after being suspended amid health-care service slowdowns associated with the COVID-19 crisis.
But the SHA says staffing vacancies are preventing a full resumption of the program.
“SHA did slow down a number of services in order to redeploy staff as part of the COVID-19 response and the organ donation program was one of those,” said SHA Emergency Operations Chief Derek Miller.
“We have now resumed services. We are working through some staffing vacancies that have arisen throughout this period, in Saskatoon specifically. So that service is partially resumed and the team’s working right now in order to recruit the people into those roles in order to fully resume those services as quickly as possible.”
Miller confirmed the partial resumption began on Nov. 29.
It comes as the province confirms it has met its target, set earlier this month, of returning 90 per cent of “eligible” redeployed staff by the end of November.
As of Nov. 26, 257 of the 395 services slowed since Sept. 1, 2021 have been fully resumed, the province said, while 59 services have been partially resumed.
Global News has reached out to the SHA for an updated total on the number of opportunities for organ donation missed while the program was suspended.