Addressing Saskatchewan’s Target Time Frames for Surgery

The Patient Assessment Process increases consistency and fairness by standardizing the factors physicians use to assess their patients’ level of need for surgery. Patients are given a priority level based on their condition/situation and the urgency of the procedure they require. The system helps to ensure that those with the greatest need for surgery receive it first. See Assessing Your Need.

The Surgical Patient Registry tracks patients needing surgery in the province. This comprehensive database is used to improve management of surgical access, assess system capacity and resource requirements, and reduce wait times for patients.

Target Time Frames for Surgery are performance goals for the surgical care system. They establish targets for each priority level determined through the patient assessment process. For example, the goal for priority level I is that 95% of patients be treated within 3 weeks. Currently, there are four priority levels, which apply to non-emergency surgery. Emergency patients are managed separately and are not put on a wait list.

Priority Level

Urgency Score Range

Target Time Frame

Emergency

Managed Separately

Priority I

80 to 100

95% within 3 weeks

Priority II

65 to 79

90% within 6 weeks

Priority III

50 to 64

90% within 3 months

Priority IV

1 to 49

90% within 12 months

All Cases

Within 18 months

Note: The number of priority levels was reduced six to four in April 2006 to give surgeons and regions more flexibility in managing wait lists. At the same time, the percentage targets for the lower priority levels were raised from 80% to 90%.