Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, earlier today I was talking about a situation that happened in Nahanni Butte, and my questions will be for the Minister of Health and Social Services. Mr. Speaker, can the Minister explain why the local airline wasn't able to bring the firefighters who are trained in extraction and so on to go into Nahanni Butte to deal with the crash? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, with respect to the incident in Nahanni Butte, the med response clinical lead and emergency physician performed secondary assessments and spoke with all of the patients over the phone and was able to get a sense of their injuries, their mobility, the details of the crash, as well as their medical histories. Med response was aware that there were pilots and other aircraft on the ground in Nahanni Butte, and that they were ready and willing to fly patients to Fort Simpson, but advised against the load-and-go scenario, if you wish, suggesting that a medevac would be more appropriate.
Physicians and nurses, firefighters, even, are not typically trained in pre-hospital care. In particular, they're not properly equipped and trained for providing services in an airplane that will be transporting patients from one location to the other. Often, they don't have the aero-medical trauma training, and as a result, even though they might be trained in first aid, it would be unsafe for both the patients as well as the professionals to do so.
It is critical to have properly trained medical professionals to care for patients in the air, particularly with trauma being a mechanism of the injury. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I thank the Minister for the answer. I kind of disagree with some of the stats. The Fort Simpson fire department are trained to package and transport people; they're trained in it. The Minister may shake his head. We actually had a first care paramedic trained who was in Fort Simpson who was on call at that time. So why aren't we looking at using this? Is the medevac opportunity out of Yellowknife all we're going to be using, and is this how we're going to deal with all matters in the future?
I appreciate the desire of the community to help, I appreciate the desire of the paramedic to help, and had we been doing ground transportation, it would have been absolutely reasonable to do that, but we weren't doing ground transportation, Mr. Speaker. This was an air evacuation, and as a result, you need individuals who understand the implications of transporting a patient in the air. There are significant additional risks for putting someone in an airplane and transporting them.
The med response was engaged. They were aware of who was available, but for the safety of the clients, the safety of the professionals, it was deemed appropriate to use the medevac team who was properly trained and certified in medical aviation transportation.
The Minister talks about the medevac and how they're trained and all that. Seven hours from the time the plane took off out of Yellowknife to the time the plane took the patients out of Nahanni Butte and Fort Liard. So he talks about ground transportation and these people are trained, Fort Simpson staff, hired staff, could have gotten moved in from Fort Simpson, brought in to Nahanni Butte, gone quickly across the river, and driven to Fort Liard or to Fort Simpson in a more timely manner. So can the Minister explain why it took seven hours for this process to proceed?
Once again, the med response clinical lead and the emergency physician were in contact with the patients and knew the status of the patients and were working with the patients to ensure that they were safe. As a note, and to be clear, med response was activated at 1:20 p.m. to determine the safest way to get the patients out of Nahanni Butte to appropriate medical care. At approximately 3:30 p.m., the med response provided an update regarding the ETA and flight plans. Four medics were dispatched using two different planes; one to Fort Liard with helicopter assistance over to Nahanni Butte, and one to Nahanni Butte. A Twin Otter, in fact, was the plane that was being used, because it's the largest one that can land on the runway. Med response landed in Nahanni Butte at 5:57, which, in my math, works out to about four and a half hours. During the entire time, Fort Simpson staff remained on telehealth services with staff as well as with the patients for monitoring and assistance. Our analysis shows that the timeframe to mobilize staff from one of the NTHSSA facilities to another facility for support would have been around a similar time of arrival as one done through med response.
However, we want to learn from these experiences, Mr. Speaker. A review of the incident occurred. A quality assurance team is reviewing the final report, and it will be submitted to the executive director of Clinic Integration by the end of the month. The report will inform future health authority practice when responding to similar emergencies.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
I appreciate the Minister's response. Again, I'm concerned, but it's great we're learning from it. Will the Minister make a commitment to provide that report back to social development? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I'm happy to share the finding. I would have to look at the report to make sure that there is no compromising information with respect to identifying individuals. We want to make sure that we're protecting our patients' rights as well our staff's rights to privacy, but I want the information out there; I want everybody to know it as far as what we learned and what we can improve. However, it may not include specific details as to who, what, when, and why. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Kam Lake.
