Maternity service referral wait-times drop from three months to three days

Dr Charlene Lui, a family physician at the Burnaby Maternity Clinic and the president-elect of Doctors of BC, led a project to reduce clinic referral wait times from up to 90 days to just a few days through an SSC Physician Quality Improvement (PQI) and SSC Facility Engagement (Burnaby Hospital) collaboration. 

The clinic, a key part of Burnaby's Primary Care Network, supports about 9000 visits annually, focusing on low-risk maternity care and allowing OB/GYNs to concentrate on high-risk cases.

Despite initial reluctance, Dr Lui was encouraged by peers and mentors to tackle this complex challenge, embracing the possibility of failure as a learning opportunity. The project involved numerous stakeholders and required a multifaceted approach to streamline referral processes, which varied widely in origin.

With the funding, Dr Lui met with physicians on the maternity clinic team, the staff, and the Fraser Health clinic manager to determine priorities, and highlight the importance of change. 

Team meetings were held with stakeholders and each step was tested. The feedback led to adjustments as the work progressed. “Getting the whole team involved was really important, ” says Dr Lui.

To address immediate wait-list backlogs, Dr Lui initiated a proactive approach where physicians would contact urgent cases directly, facilitating quicker access to care and ensuring necessary tests were ordered in advance of visits. This effort was supported by PQI staff, notably Janice Eng, who praised Dr Lui's openness and resilience.

Staff retention emerged as a challenge, with high patient volumes leading to burnout. The project faced a temporary halt but was restarted, and within two months of restarting the project, Dr Lui’s aim of reducing wait-times to one or two days was achieved. Dr Lui observes, “while the outcome of improving access was huge, it was really about delivering the best care, while taking into account the needs of the patients, the physicians, the managers and staff.

“It was about building communication pathways and creating a shared culture of ‘we are in this together’ – that is what makes me proud.”

This project was supported by SSC Physician Quality Improvement, the Burnaby Hospital Medical Staff Physician Society, SSC Facility Engagement.