Air and ground transfers of children to hospital in Saskatoon are on the rise, and it's not sitting well with some families of sick kids.
CBC obtained data via an access to information request that shows pediatric patients transferred from Regina to Saskatoon between 2010 and 2017.
The numbers show that transfers started a trend upward after 2013, the same year the province decided to in Saskatoon.
"The bad thing about it being centralized in one area is that your families are potentially being sent away from where their supports are," said Moose Jaw mother Kristin Hordyk.
In 2015, Hordyk and her husband were rushed to Calgary via air ambulance, as Hordyk was giving birth six weeks early to their daughter, Elizabeth.
"There was a lot of unknowns already with having a premature baby, it just really added to that. It meant we had to try and look after a lot of details that we wouldn't have had to look after otherwise," Hordyk said.
There were little things, like bringing the wrong shoes, and no socks.
"It added a lot of details that we had to figure out on top of the stress of not knowing what was going to be happening with our baby, how she was doing, how all those sorts of things," she said.
Her husband slept in the hallway that night, and luckily, was offered a spot at the Ronald McDonald House for the rest of their 10-day stay.
Their 2 lbs., 11 oz baby girl was born the next day.
Hordyk said it was tough to not have family close by to help out, especially as it was their first child.
'Straight up exhausting'
Jacqueline Hobbs is also familiar with the strain it can pose to constantly be travelling for health care. Her son Bailey Hittinger has had health problems from birth, with issues like asthma, a rare allergy, and skin concerns, and several of the teenager's doctors work in Saskatoon.
"It's straight up exhausting," Hobbs said of having to travel back and forth from their home in Moose Jaw.
When Hittinger is getting care in Moose Jaw, Hobbs is able to visit him during her lunch breaks and after work, while family and friends are also able to drop in on him.
But extended trips to Saskatoon often mean that Hobbs must miss days of work, has to struggle to figure out alternate arrangements for her daughter, and has to figure out arrangements for accommodations and to pay for meals.
"We don't have that extra support," she said, with Hittinger adding that as a patient, he gets pretty lonely with just his mother for company.
Before moving to Saskatchewan, the family lived in Kelowna, B.C. While it's a city with a population less than 200,000 people, Hobbs said the specialists they needed were available there.
"Here we don't have that option," she said. "It's been 12 years that we've been doing this ongoing adventure, as we like to call it."
Offering best care important, says minister
Minister of Health Jim Reiter said when the decision was made to centralize services, it was expected that some patients would end up being transferred to Saskatoon.
"It wasn't about saving money; It was about offering the best care they could for the patients," he said, adding that care at the Royal University Hospital is "outstanding" and his belief is that patient outcomes are very good at the hospital.
With a children's hospital slated to open in Saskatoon next year, patients would also benefit from "state of the art" pediatric equipment and services, he said.
The province is dedicated to covering the cost of transfers and doing what it can to support patients and their families who need accommodations, according to Reiter.
With a province with a relatively small population, and a large land base, patient travel for specialty services is hard to avoid, he said.
"It would be nice if everybody didn't have to travel but it's a fact of life in rural Saskatchewan."
Data needed on outcomes, costs, says Meili
Ryan Meili, leader of the NDP opposition, noted there are two major centres in the province that offer health care.
"It's a big challenge for people from the south, where a lot of people live, to always be travelling north to Saskatoon," he said, adding patients' and families' concerns about this issue have to be taken into account.
Meili noted that the pediatric care in RUH is excellent, but for the province to get a better picture on the issue of transfers, it should look at outcomes for patients before and after the decision to centralize services. He also suggested the province should look at an economic analysis of the move.
"You have to actually go in and do the math and find out - is the cost issue balanced off by cost savings by not having a PICU running here in Regina?"