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In looking for a light to shine through the darkness surrounding the last weekend’s horrific Humboldt Broncos bus accident, we search for something positive to be learned and actioned.  Saving lives of others, someone's child, mother, father, someone loved by someone; all are equally important.

I ask for our leaders of this province; Premier Scott Moe, Saskatchewan Minister of Health Jim Reiter, Minister of Rural and Remote Health Greg Ottenbreit and the Sask Health Authority to pay attention. Pay attention to the response times of ambulances dependant on locations of hospital emergency services considering distances (time) to get emergency patients to the care they deserve, equally deserved by all residents of this province.

Our Preeceville hospital emergency services are open 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (12 hours) Monday to Friday and 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. (8.5 hours) Saturdays and Sundays.  Emergency service is required nothing short of 24 hours a day!

Now place a critical accident in an area served under Preeceville 30 minutes north or west and that doesn’t even consider the distance one might be off the main highway in an outlying rural location. 

An ambulance has over a one-hour window to the Preeceville hospital; 30-plus minutes to the site and the same 30 minutes back to Preeceville if Preeceville emergency is open; one hour not including care and loading.

Then, when Preeceville is closed, it’s another 40 minutes to the next emergency service in Canora or 60 minutes to Yorkton. Or in the case of extreme critical care we are transferred from Yorkton and off to Regina or Saskatoon which is another two hours and 10 minutes to Regina or three hours and 20 minutes to Saskatoon, or directly from Preeceville to Regina or Saskatoon, which are three hours away! You would think we are in a remote area, but rather we are in an area not properly served. When our emergency is closed we are looking at two to five hours to care on a regular basis.

And it gets worse. We have two ambulances based in Preeceville. However, should need arrive elsewhere, our ambulances are pulled to wherever the needs are. These same ambulances are used for transporting day patients to the city for testing, thus removing them from our community for long periods of time on a daily basis. Now tell me, does that put the same pit in your stomach as it does mine?

With these kinds of times, a severely injured patient doesn't stand a chance to survive.

The Broncos’ bus accident survivors had to wait too long to get to care when emergency services were minutes away. Minutes are too long. In what kind of a life-and-death situation does that put us?

We are not even totally certain we have enough bandages in our Preeceville Hospital to stop bleeding in dire circumstances the way things stand currently. But we do have three doctors and one nurse practitioner, which our wonderful community rallied to obtain.

We have the doctors we need rather than providing what our community needs, which is emergency services. We find the doctor’s office open extended hours to include Saturdays and Sundays, which is likely only to be a negative factor in retaining and hiring doctors. 

Leaders of our province and health care, take a long look at the needs of our area as we too have emergency needs: accidents, heart attacks and births, etc., the same as all taxpayers.

See a community crying out for help and reinstate our 24-hour emergency service and our acute beds.

A concerned mother and grandmother living in the Preeceville area,