{"id":503216,"date":"2026-01-09T07:23:23","date_gmt":"2026-01-09T07:23:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/503216\/"},"modified":"2026-01-09T07:23:23","modified_gmt":"2026-01-09T07:23:23","slug":"alberta-doctors-plead-for-state-of-emergency-as-hospitals-overwhelmed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/503216\/","title":{"rendered":"Alberta doctors plead for state of emergency as hospitals overwhelmed"},"content":{"rendered":"

Doctors want the Alberta government to declare a state of emergency for hospitals across the province, as more people come forward with stories of nearly dying while waiting to be seen.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s very difficult to deliver safe and timely care in all of our emergency departments and hospitals across the province right now,\u201d said Paul Parks, president-elect of the emergency physicians\u2019 section of the Alberta Medical Association.<\/p>\n

He spoke out on behalf of hundreds of emergency and internal medicine doctors across the province.<\/p>\n

Physicians are using concerning language, saying they have never seen Alberta\u2019s emergency departments as overwhelmed as they have been this winter.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t just Dr. Paul Park saying the sky is falling,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is actually a plea for help to our government from our front-line health-care workers in our hospitals, saying it is getting impossible to deliver safety and timely care to all of patients and we need help \u2014 we need a provincial response.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Long wait times in the E.R., code reds<\/a> when there are no ambulances available, lengthy waits for surgeries and tests, situations where four people are put in hospital rooms designed for two, and more sick patients than beds to put them in is, sadly, nothing new in Alberta \u2014 it\u2019s been a growing issue for over a decade.<\/p>\n

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Parks said the increasing population is only exacerbating the pressure.<\/p>\n

At the same time, the province has spent recent years dismantling the province-wide, all-encompassing Alberta Health Services provider into four different agencies \u2014 which Parks said hasn\u2019t helped.<\/p>\n

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\u201cFor months and months, we\u2019ve been pleading for help. And for the last three years, it\u2019s been constant reorganization, constant chaos.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEdmonton paramedics exhausted amid long response times, fewer staff: \u2018It\u2019s heartbreaking\u2019\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

Parks says the situation at hospitals is dire and it\u2019s not just in emergency rooms \u2014 there just isn\u2019t the space to safely care for people in all areas.<\/p>\n

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\u201cAll of these stressors and all of this chaos is now leading to where we\u2019re hearing about patients dying in our waiting rooms \u2014 and it\u2019s not just one case that makes it public, it\u2019s many,\u201d Parks said.<\/p>\n

Parks\u2019 plea comes after an Edmonton father died just before Christmas in the Grey Nuns Hospital emergency room, where he waited for eight hours and never saw a doctor.<\/p>\n

Prashant Sreekumar, 44, went to the south Edmonton hospital with chest pains and died of apparent cardiac arrest while waiting for care<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEdmonton father dies waiting to see a doctor in hospital E.R.\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

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Other Albertans are coming forward with similar stories.<\/p>\n

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On Dec. 20, 2025 \u2014 two days before Sreekumar died \u2014 retired nurse Kelly Marlow was taken to Grey Nuns in an ambulance with similar symptoms.<\/p>\n

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She was throwing up, had chest pains, numb hands and has a history of heart problems. She said it isn\u2019t the first time she\u2019s had a sudden-onset hypertensive crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have gone by EMS to the hospital twice for this,\u201d she said, adding those times she was triaged to be seen quickly.<\/p>\n

This time \u2014 not so much.<\/p>\n

Marlow said she waited seven hours before being seen by a doctor. She was left alone in a wheelchair in the waiting room, she said, because her paramedics said they were being sent back out to a different call.<\/p>\n

\u201cI communicated to the nurses that I really did think I was dying. I was having chest pains. My vision wasn\u2019t great, I couldn\u2019t feel my hands, I knew my blood pressure was still severely high. I could not stop throwing up.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marlow knew from her 33 years of professional experience as a nurse that something was wrong.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI was alone, I was scared, I did worry that I was going to die there in the E.R. that night.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Eventually, she was able to get a nurse\u2019s attention and things progressed.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt that point she did check my blood pressure again and was quite alarmed \u2014 and I was in, within a few minutes from that time.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Marlow was later told by her cardiologist she likely only survived because her heart is strong \u2014 but next time she may not be as lucky.<\/p>\n

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\u201cHonestly, it was probably one of the worse nights of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Every day across Alberta, Parks said there\u2019s hundreds of sick or injured people sitting in pain in waiting rooms or laying on stretchers in hospital hallways, waiting their turn for desperately-needed care.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s lots of patients that are suffering for 10, 12, 14 hours with severe pain that we can\u2019t get pain meds or comfort to. It\u2019s day in, day out in every one of our emergency departments.<\/p>\n

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