Study
| EST. READ TIME 2 MIN.Canada’s health-care wait times hit 27.7 weeks in 2023—longest ever recorded
Waiting Your Turn: Wait Times for Health Care in Canada, 2023 Report
Each year, the Fraser Institute surveys physicians across twelve specialties and the ten provinces in order to document the queues for visits to specialists and for diagnostic and surgical procedures in Canada. Waiting Your Turn: Wait Times for Health Care in Canada, 2023 Report reports the results of this year’s survey.
In 2023, physicians report a median wait time of 27.7 weeks between a referral from a general practitioner and receipt of treatment. This represents the longest delay in the survey’s history and is 198% longer than the 9.3 weeks Canadian patients could expect to wait in 1993.
Overall, Ontario reports the shortest wait across Canada (21.6 weeks) while Nova Scotia had the longest (56.7 weeks).
The 27.7 week total wait time that patients face can be examined in two consecutive segments:
- referral by a general practitioner to consultation with a specialist: 14.6 weeks;
- consultation with a specialist to receipt of treatment: 13.1 weeks.
After seeing a specialist, Canadian patients were waiting 4.6 weeks longer than what physicians consider clinically reasonable (8.5 weeks).
Across the ten provinces, the study also estimates that there were 1,209,194 procedures for which patients—3% of the Canadian population—were waiting in 2023.
Patients also face considerable delays for diagnostic technology. This year, Canadians could expect to wait 6.6 weeks for a CT scan, 12.9 for an MRI scan, and 5.3 weeks for an ultrasound.
Survey results suggest that, despite provincial strategies to reduce wait times, Canadian patients continue to wait too long for medically necessary treatment.
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Mackenzie Moir
Senior Policy Analyst, Fraser Institute
Mackenzie Moir is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Fraser Institute. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Nursing fromYork University and a Master of Science in Health Policy and Research from the University of Alberta. Mr Moir has previous clinical experience and has provided direct care in general medicine, palliative care, cardiology, oncology, and neurology settings. In addition to several academic publications, his commentaries have appeared in University Affairs, the Financial Post, and Globe and Mail. His research focuses on the performance of health-care systems, patient choice, and health-related quality of life.… Read more Read Less… -
Bacchus Barua
Director, Health Policy Studies, Fraser InstituteBacchus Barua is Director of the Fraser Institute’s Centre for Health Policy Studies. He completed his BA (Honours) in Economicsat the University of Delhi (Ramjas College) and received an MA in Economics from Simon Fraser University. Mr. Barua has conducted research on a range of key health-care topics including hospital performance, access to new pharmaceuticals, the sustainability of health-care spending, the impact of aging on health-care expenditures, and international comparisons of health-care systems. He also designed the Provincial Healthcare Index (2013), co-led the creation of Comparing Performance of Universal Health Care Countries (2016) and co-authored the Fraser Institute’s annual survey of wait times, Waiting Your Turn, for over a decade (2010–2022). In 2022, Bacchus was invited to provide testimony as part of a panel of witnesses for the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health (HESA). Mr. Barua is a frequent commentator on radio and television, and his articles have appeared in well-known news outlets including the National Post, Wall Street Journal, Globe and Mail, Maclean’s, and forbes.com.… Read more Read Less…
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