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Virtual doctors are one of several options that are being examined to provide overnight emergency care in Tumbler Ridge, B.C.
The lack of overnight care has been top of mind for many residents ever since Northern Health announced on-call hours for physicians in the community would be scaled back last September.
While on-call doctors had previously provided 24/7 coverage for the community of approximately 2,400 people, those services are currently only provided between 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. MT. Anyone needing services overnight are required to travel to either Dawson Creek of Chetwynd, both about 100 kilometres away by road.
The reduction in service has prompted hundreds of people to take to the streets in protest and it has been a top priority for mayor and council, even as the community navigates the impacts of a mass shooting in February.
Now, a joint statement from Northern Health and the District of Tumbler Ridge indicates the two parties have come to an agreement to find a new way forward for overnight care that doesn’t require on-call physicians in the community at all times, but still provides consistent coverage.
Described as a “consensus on a way forward,” the statement does not go into detail about what that coverage will look like, but says both sides have to recognize “concerns over how emergency health-care services are accessed overnight, while also acknowledging the necessity for change in light of recruitment and retention challenges.”
Alternatives to in-person, on-call services being explored, the statement says, include the use of virtual care, connecting doctors from other communities to patients in Tumbler Ridge.
A virtual doctor pilot project is currently underway at several rural and remote emergency rooms in B.C.’s Interior, with doctors at hospitals in Nakusp, Princeton, Clearwater and Lillooet sharing responsibilities for overnight care by having a single emergency physician working physically in one location and virtually at the other three.
The community health centre for Tumbler Ridge, B.C., a UNESCO Global Geopark in northeast B.C. on Sept. 25, 2025. (Andrew Kurjata/CBC)
Northern Health CEO Ciro Panessa said not requiring doctors in Tumbler Ridge to be on-call 24/7 would help ease the burden on the already overworked physicians.
“What ended up happening [under the previous system] is you’d have a very small number of overnight calls that would require a lot of in-person resourcing,” he said in an interview. “And that would really limit our ability to provide stable, consistent primary and community care services [during the day], and it would certainly cause challenges.”
Panessa said the purpose of the announcement was to signal that Northern Health and the District of Tumbler Ridge are working together collaboratively on a solution and would be providing joint updates moving forward.
Tumbler Ridge Mayor Darryl Krakowka was not immediately available for an interview but said in a statement that he expects more announcements to come in the future.
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