Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I have questions for the Minister of Health and Social Services. During the last session, the honourable Member from Frame Lake addressed an issue that I would like to follow up on today regarding the wait time for people who see hearing specialists or audiologists in the NWT. One of the Minister's responses last session was that Health and Social Services was going to release a review on addressing wait times for audiologists. When can we expect this report to be released to the public? Thank you.
Minister of Health and Social Services.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am going to have to go back and review the previous audit because I don't recall saying we are doing a review that we are going to release on audiology.
We are currently reviewing a number of our services in a number of the areas that we are providing. We certainly were working to address some of the challenges and wait times that we were feeling in our experience in audiology. As a result, last sitting, last budget session, we actually increased the number of audiologists in the Northwest Territories by creating a position in the Beaufort-Delta. Currently, all three of those positions, all three of the audiology positions we have in the Northwest Territories, are filled, and we are hoping to see some improvements in our wait times as a result of those investments. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
It looks like the Minister has answered some of my other questions, but maybe I could ask a question a little bit differently. The department has some plans, long-term plans, to reduce the wait list in the future for audiologists. Can the Minister explain what some of those long-term plans are?
As I indicated, one of the primary things that we did to help with our wait times is we actually created a position in the Beaufort-Delta that will be providing audiology services to both the Beaufort-Delta and the Sahtu. Initially, those services were provided out of Yellowknife by the two different audiologist positions that we had, and they are done by way of travel clinics, five-day travel clinics per year.
Those travel clinics are no longer required, because they will be handled by the audiologist up in the Beaufort-Delta, and those five day clinics that the Yellowknife office was providing will now be provided in the South Slave, so we will be enhancing the number of audiology visits that we have in different jurisdictions within this territory.
We believe that that will help us bring down the wait list times. I do want to be clear, though. As with the mental health wait lists that we were discussing earlier or later last week, where there is urgency or risk, we do get our patients in immediately. Where they are considered non-urgent, that is where the wait lists exist.
Back in October of last year, during session, a story came out on the way that Health and Social Services was looking at the priority list. It said priority 1 was 72 hours, working its way down to four months on priority 5. The reason that I am asking questions today is because there is an elder from Detah that is telling me that he was told that he had to wait maybe two years before he would see somebody that could work with him.
I am wondering if there is any plan for addressing people that may not have the greatest need, but do need to see someone sooner than two years, or maybe even sooner than four months. I am wondering if there is any sort of reprioritizing of the list.
My list shows that our wait times in 2017-2018 for adults was about 47 weeks, and that is non-urgent cases. It is about 40 weeks for [2:09]. If the Member is aware of an individual who has been told that it is going to be over two years, I would suggest that the best way to deal with that is to meet with me and discuss that particular file. I am not prepared to discuss the file of an individual here in this Assembly.
Having said that, Mr. Speaker, we have filled that position in the Beaufort-Delta. That was filled in December. We are only just now fully staffed with the three positions. We are only now able to provide those services in the Beaufort-Delta and the Sahtu without having to do the travel clinics. We are only now in a position to roll those travel days that were allocated to the Beaufort-Delta into the southern part of this territory.
We now are in a position to start seeing some improvements in this area, and we will continue to monitor to make sure that we are improving those wait times and providing the services that the residents expect and hope for.
Oral questions. Member for Tu Nedhe-Wiilideh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister is telling me now that all of the positions are filled. Does that mean, essentially, the priority lists would come down? I think at one point you said just now 47 weeks, but would that list now go down to a reasonable amount so that all people that are waiting for this service can be seen within a month? Thank you.
We do have a long way to go, as the Member knows. We have a bit of a backlog that we need to work our way through to the point where we can actually have quicker turnaround times on all of our files, to have a standard or a more reasonable wait time for initial assessments, but we need to get rid of some of the backlog. We need to work through some of the backlog.
It is going to be a lot of work. I can't say that we are going to see immediate improvement and a more reasonable wait time immediately. It is going to take us a bit of time, but we are now in a position to start knocking off some of those wait times and bring down some of those wait times. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Oral questions. Member for Yellowknife North.
