Surgery Updates

Last updated: June 22, 2021

Over the last 24 hours, the North Bay Regional Health Centre (NBRHC) has seen a dramatic increase in patients with COVID-19 admitted to our Health Centre.

We now have 8 patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in our facility—these are local patients as none of the 8 hospitalized patients are transfers from other hospitals.

The Health Centre has enacted the final stage of its COVID-19 Bed Plan which is triggered when all of our designated COVID-19 beds are full.

This increase in COVID-19 patients, combined with our existing bed pressures, means our hospital will have to increase measures to protect and preserve our hospital’s capacity to provide acute care. This could include patients being moved to unconventional spaces such as a sun room.

Effective today, all surgeries that require a hospital stay (versus outpatient and return home) will be postponed.  The postponement of these surgeries will be assessed on a weekly basis.

Outpatient surgeries will continue as well as confirmed cancer cases.

The Health Centre will continue to monitor COVID-19 cases both in the hospital and community to determine the impact this could have on other services and procedures.  The goal is to resume all surgeries as soon as we have capacity to safely care for all our patients.

Patients with existing surgeries and appointments will be contacted directly by the hospital. Your Health Care Team will continue to review and prioritize urgent health care needs as we work through this crisis.

Patients can still attend scheduled outpatient appointments and our emergency department remains open. In an emergency, please don’t hesitate or delay receiving care. Our Health Centre is prepared to safely provide care to all our patients

At this time Care Partners restrictions remain status quo. However, to ensure we can continue to safely welcome Care Partners into the Health Centre, we ask you to carefully review our Care Partner Guidelines.

More information will be shared as it becomes available.