Daphne Bramham: B.C. health system continues to fail women with gynecologic cancers

For years, Dr. Sarah Finlayson and her seven colleagues have been begging for help because they know they’re failing thousands of B.C. women diagnosed each year with gynecological cancers.

With only eight gynecologic oncologists, British Columbia has the fewest of these subspecialists of any province in Canada. It means, Finlayson said, women here are “woefully underserviced.”

“It’s heartbreaking. The wait times are the longest they’ve ever been in my career. The moral distress among our group is the highest it’s been in my career.”

B.C. has one gynecologic oncologist for every 637,000 people. Ontario has one for every 350,000 people. To match Ontario, B.C. would require 14 of the specialists. Saskatchewan with a population of 1.2 million has seven.

Vancouver Island with a population of 865,000 and annual population growth of about one per cent a year has only had two for the past decade.