Sask. residents leave province for MRIs due to cost, wait times

Jon Struthers suspected he had a torn ACL after a hockey injury last March, but his doctor disagreed and sent him for an X-ray instead.

“An X-ray isn’t going to do a lot for ligaments and tendons, so it was not super-beneficial,” said Struthers, who wanted an MRI to confirm his injury.

“Without a referral to get an MRI, which I didn’t get, you don’t have a lot of choice.”

So the Regina man decided to book a private scan during a vacation in Scottsdale, Ariz. The appointment cost US$260, and was booked eight days before the trip.

The MRI, which creates detailed images of organs and tissues in the body, took 45 minutes and showed a torn ACL and MCL when the results were available to Struthers the next day.

The majority of people in Saskatchewan are waiting up to 246 days to receive an MRI, according to the latest data from the province. Some will have less of a wait if they are deemed high priority.

There are 12 MRI scanners here — one in each of Moose Jaw and Lloydminster and the rest in Saskatoon and Regina.

Saskatchewan’s first portable pediatric MRI will soon roll into Saskatoon’s Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital after $1 million in fundraising efforts.

The province also recently declined a $2-million donation to purchase an MRI machine for the hospital in Estevan, citing concerns about operating costs.

‘No clear path’

Struthers considered private MRIs in the province before booking the procedure in the U.S., but the cost was more than $1,000 and still required a doctor’s referral.

“There’s no clear path to get it done in Saskatchewan right now,” he said.

In June, Swift Current’s Diane Lang paid $1,300 for a faster MRI in Lethbridge, Alta., as she feared the pain in her armpit was due to cancer.

Her health conditions put her on the urgent list in Saskatchewan, meaning she should have received an appointment within two to seven days. But she remained on the waitlist for more than two months.

“My family got very frustrated for the wait because I’m diminishing in certain ways,” she said.

When she took the results from the Alberta MRI to her doctor, they were inconclusive. She received a second MRI in Saskatchewan in July, which also provided no clear answers.

Earlier this month, a third MRI scan resulted in a breast cancer diagnosis.

“I think the health-care system in our province is a travesty. I think our government is doing nothing towards it,” she said.

“This cancer has potentially spread now because of what’s happening to me. If we would have found it earlier, that might not have been the case.”

Seeing the provincial government turn down the donation for an MRI scanner in Estevan was disheartening.

“We need that equipment in our province,” she said.

Struthers agrees that the provincial government needs to be doing more, and should have taken another look about the MRI machine in Estevan.

“No one has access to anything, and everyone suffers,” he said. “It’s just illogical and it makes no sense.”

In a statement, the Ministry of Health said the Government of Saskatchewan is continuing to invest in increasing MRI capacity. The 2023-24 budget includes $3.85 million to increase MRI capacity by 4,706 additional patients.

MRI capacity has increased from 15,700 patients in 2007 to 37,000 in 2022-23, an increase of 136 per cent.

Diane Lang travelled outside of the province to Lethbridge for an MRI after long wait times in Saskatchewan. (Submitted)