HALIFAX – Nova Scotia is reporting a drop of 35 per cent in the number of hours emergency departments were closed across the province.
A new provincial report says that between April 2023 and the end of March 2024, ERs were closed for 51,552 hours.
That’s down from 79,813 closure hours in the previous 12-month period.
In the latest report, released in late December, there were 28,171 hours during which ERs could not open because they did not have enough staff to safely operate — down from 41,923 hours over the prior 12 months.
The report says health-care worker recruitment and retention efforts have been ongoing to reduce staffing shortages in ERs.
And while things are improving, ER closures caused by a lack of workers represented 55 per cent of all closures between April 2023 and March 2024.
Over that 12-month period, Nova Scotia emergency rooms were open for 87 per cent of their official operating hours.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 8, 2025.
