HALIFAX: Although Nova Scotia continues record few new cases of COVID-19, the premier is cautious about opening up to other Atlantic provinces.
“The weeks though are critical,” Premier Stephen McNeil said. “We are testing and monitoring as businesses are opening. The incubation period for COVID is about 14 days so we don’t know for the past two weeks if there’s been any spread in our community.”
There is a need to continue monitoring COVID-19 cases over the next few weeks but even if they stay low and there is no community spread, Nova Scotia’s first priority is to ease restrictions, including expanding the family bubble, McNeil said.
“Nova Scotia is open to an Atlantic bubble, but we cannot put a date on it until we are sure our case numbers are low and the cases in other provinces remain low,” the premier said in a statement issued June 10. “We will decide when to lift those restrictions based on science.”
The province has reconciled and consolidated data sources to ensure all publicly reported data comes from one source, Panorama, the province’s public health reporting system. Updated data is available at: https://novascotia.ca/coronavirus/data.
“Nova Scotia is the first province in the country to integrate our lab data with our public health reporting system,” said Dr. Robert Strang, Nova Scotia’s chief medical officer of health. “Panorama is the gold standard and gives us the most up-to-date and comprehensive COVID-19 data.”
The “recovered” category has been renamed “resolved” to more accurately account for all COVID-19 cases whose investigations are considered completed and closed by public health. The breakdown of total number of cases by location is now based on the Nova Scotia Health Authority (NSHA) zone of the individual’s residence, not where their sample was collected for testing.
Nova Scotians who are tested for COVID-19 will now be given the option to receive their results by e-mail.
This option will be provided to those who visit primary assessment centres, which are the COVID-19 testing locations people are directed to by 811.
“We want to deliver results more quickly to people, while also ensuring they have the information they need,” said Gary O’Toole, Senior Director, Population and Public Health at the NSHA. “The need for COVID-19 tests continues to be high and we also want to be prepared for potential second and third waves of the disease.”
Anyone registering at a primary assessment centre will be asked to provide their e-mail address. If an address is provided and test results are negative, an e-mail will be sent. The person will follow a link in the e-mail and will sign in using their Nova Scotia health card number to review their result. Information provided will help the person understand what they need to do next.
All positive results for COVID-19 will continue to be delivered by phone.
Results for anyone tested who did not provide an e-mail will be delivered by phone.
Public Health has also launched a toll-free number to support Nova Scotians with questions about their test results. This includes if someone does not receive their result within 72 hours.
In the past few months, more than 60 staff have been delivering test results to more than 40,000 Nova Scotians by phone. The majority of those results were given within the 48 to 72 hour range.
“We have learned a lot over the past few months,” said O’Toole. “Changing and adapting is a part of this process and we hope that these changes will be helpful to Nova Scotians.”
In the meantime, the NSHA has reported progress in its process of gradually reintroducing programs and services.
“We know our patients continue to have concerns regarding the status of the surgery, procedure, or treatment they were scheduled to receive in recent months,” said Dr. Brendan Carr, NSHA president and CEO. “We are making all efforts to assess and prioritize patients as our clinical teams review patient lists and reschedule appointments. This process will take time and we again ask for patience as we continue to increase the level of activity within our programs and services.”
One of the key areas of service reintroduction is surgery. While emergency, urgent and time-sensitive cancer surgeries continued during COVID-19, there were 3,214 scheduled surgeries postponed between March 16 and May 25. The current approach to increase the number of surgeries is to focus on priority areas without impacting inpatient care needs. That includes completing day surgeries and outpatient procedures such as cataract surgeries and endoscopy procedures.
As of June 11, 22 per cent of the patients who had their scheduled surgeries postponed had their surgery completed and 11 per cent of those postponed were given a new surgery date.
“Our teams are working hard to prioritize cases and increase our capacity so that as many Nova Scotians as possible can get the surgery they need,” said Dr. Greg Hirsch, senior medical director, Perioperative (Surgical) Services “We have made adjustments to how we deliver and schedule services to allow for more surgery while maintaining COVID-19 precautions.”
Progress has been made to increase the number of endoscopy procedures, which increased from 89 between May 18-24, to 422 from June 1-7.
Other areas where the level of activity has increased includes blood collection services which saw a 23.5 per cent increase.
Across the province, outpatient clinics – that include clinics for IV treatments, blood transfusions, and wound care and specialist consultations – have been increasing the number of appointments available while providing urgent care.
Cervical cancer screening is resuming and information about cervical and colon cancer screening is available at: www.nshealth.ca/cancer-care.
Patients will be contacted directly when their appointment has been scheduled. Those who feel their health status has changed should contact their primary care provider (physician or nurse practitioner) or health care team. Patients are reminded that NSHA is taking precautions to ensure our facilities are safe and public health measures continue inside its facilities, including social distancing and access control.
Since the pandemic began, Nova Scotians continued to receive primary care, emergency and urgent care, virtual care in many programs and services and mental health and additions support.
“We knew since the beginning of the pandemic it was vital to continue to deliver a continuum of mental health and addictions services including outpatient, crisis and inpatient care to meet people’s needs,” said Sam Hodder, senior director, Mental Health and Addictions Program. “Our outpatient services have been supported primarily using telephone and video platform visits and in-person when needed. Our priority was to make sure we were meeting the needs of Nova Scotians at this time.”
From March 22 to May 30, the level of activity within the Mental Health and Addictions Program included: 4,945 calls to the provincial crisis line;
1,698 new intake assessments completed for services; 36,012 appointments by phone or video; and 5,394 visits to the Opioid Use Disorder Treatment (OUDT) program.
In recent months, the Mental Health and Addictions Program also accelerated the launch of three new online tools, available free of charge, to support Nova Scotians.
As of May 13, 2,531 people registered and 2,033 enrolled in the 30-day challenge Mindwell-U. In Therapy Assistance Online (TAO), 1,098 self-help sessions were completed between April 1 and May 31. And I-CAN (Conquer Anxiety and Nervousness) has made 547 self-referrals since March 18.