A Virtual Emergency Care pilot project has been proposed in four communities that includes the Dr Helmcken Memorial Hospital in Clearwater.
Interior Health (IH) in collaboration with the Ministry of Health is engaging with partners to better support overnight emergency care through a mix of virtual and on-site staffing.
In a release, IH stated the community hospital sites (Clearwater, Nakusp, Lillooet, and Princeton) are similar in size with low overnight patient volumes which would allow physicians to share responsibilities, ultimately helping maintain access to care, promote physician wellness and improve staff retention.
“Virtual care is not new in Emergency Departments across the Nation,” Karen Cooper, Executive Director for Clinical Operations said, “It’s one of the innovative solutions that helps to keep many small rural Emergencies alive. This will be the first time in Interior Health that we have used a Virtual Emergency model that uses our own physicians. We have in the past have supported some of our small rural emergency departments using a service through the rural coordinator centre of BC called VERRa (Virtual Emergency Room Rural assistance).”
Cooper said they are taking a team approach by bringing four of our hospitals together to work in that team approach where one site every night supports not only their own site, but the other 3 sites to be able to provide that continuous, reliable, service for the public.
She noted Interior Health is hoping to be able to go live with this new service model in January 2026.
We asked how the Dr. Helmcken Memorial Hospital in Clearwater was chosen as one of the communities to be included in this project.
“We looked at data from right across Interior Health and we recognized these four sites have very similar profiles. That is they are open 24-hours a day because they are remote and it’s often one to two hours to the next site. They also have the overnight volumes that make a model like this feasible. Each of these sites have volumes that are ranging in the two to three patients overnight and we know from looking at virtual models cross Canada that the optimal rates of physicians supporting a site virtually is to be able to do one to two visits an hour. When you combine the four sites with eight to ten visits overnight they really fit the mold well as potential places to start with a model like this.”
When asked why the 100 Mile District General Hospital wasn’t included as one of the chosen communities for this project, Cooper said at some point they may consider a site like 100 Mile House for a model like this.
“What makes 100 Mile House different is that it is a busier Emergency Department and it’s overnight volumes definitely exceed what we’ve seen where virtual emergency department support can work. Our model will be able to start in these smaller sites with low volume. Does it mean that we can eventually go to more medium sized sites like 100 Mile and maybe a single model? This is what we’re hoping to learn. While it’s not part of this proposed pilot that doesn’t mean at some point it couldn’t be a solution that supports that site,” Cooper said.
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