Article content

Emergency room wait times at The Ottawa Hospital were the longest in the province this summer, in part because of the introduction of a new electronic medical records system in June.

Health Quality Ontario, which tracks hospital quality measures, reported that emergency room wait times in July averaged 3.6 hours at The Ottawa Hospital’s General campus, more than double the provincial average, putting it last in the province.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Ottawa Hospital ER wait times longest in the province Back to video

Wait times at the hospital’s Civic campus during the same month averaged 3.2 hours. The only other hospital in the province with wait times averaging more than three hours was Hawkesbury and District General Hospital with an average wait time of 3.4 hours.

Long emergency room waits continue as Ottawa prepares for the beginning of flu and virus season in coming weeks, which traditionally means a higher volume of emergency room visits.

But Alan Forster, the hospital’s vice-president of quality and innovation, said the hospital has been tracking the situation closely and is working with the province to improve ER wait times.