FILE PHOTO.

Image Credit: PEXELS

The pediatric ward at Kelowna General Hospital has been closed due to a doctor shortage, and while Interior Health said more are on the way, it’s unclear whether new staff will be enough to address the allegedly poor working conditions at the hospital.

The 10-bed pediatric ward is closed until sometime in July, but some pediatric services, including emergency services, are still available.

Interior Health would not provide someone to be interviewed and instead sent a statement to be attributed to the hospital's chief of staff Dr. Cara Wall.

In the written statement, Wall said three new pediatricians have officially signed on, one job offer is pending and the hospital is currently working on seven more pediatric recruits. She didn't say when they would start working at the hospital.

“Our priority is to ensure new physicians are well prepared and supported from acceptance to their first day on the job,” Wall said in the statement.

Dr. Hannah Duyvewaardt posted a video last week talking about the unsafe and stressful working conditions for pediatricians at the hospital and pointed to those conditions as the reason why pediatricians don’t want to work at the hospital.

“They're saying that this is due to doctor shortage, which is sort of true, but there are other factors involved,” she said in the video.

Duyvewaardt said there's only one pediatrician working at a time and they have to juggle covering the pediatric ward as well as several other departments like the maternity ward and neonatal intensive care unit.

She said doctors have been sounding the alarm about unsafe conditions for years.

“They have advocated saying this is an unsafe work environment for patients,” she said. “We're having a doctor shortage because they're worried about putting their own moral and professional integrity at risk, as well as patients.”

The chief of staff said that the hospital has marketing campaigns, attends events and tries to attract candidates to Kelowna with various incentives, but she didn’t address what kind of working conditions are promised to potential recruits. 

“Our medical staff recruitment team and KGH medical leadership work hand-in-hand to facilitate a seamless candidate experience by coordinating introductions, interviews, site visits, and medical license verification, while providing end-to-end support through job offers, sponsorship and supervision letters, and assistance with immigration processes whenever possible,” Wall said in the statement.

READ MORE: BC teacher who hooked up with graduating student banned for 15 years

Interior Health still has five online job postings for pediatricians. The salary range is between $400,000 and $600,000 a year with up to $15,000 in moving assistance.

The listing said pediatricians can expect to be on-call for one out of every seven weeks and shifts can be up to 15 hours.

Last week, MLAs in the Legislative Assembly pressed the Minister of Health about the ward closure.

“Pediatric services were being shut down at Kelowna General Hospital for at least six weeks. There was no official communication from the ministry or Interior Health. This means no pediatric care in one of B.C.'s busiest hospitals,” Kelowna Centre BC Conservative MLA for Kristina Loewen said.

Health Minister Josie Osborne said that the hospital is going to continue working on hiring more doctors. She said a full complement of pediatricians would be 12 but the hospital only has six.

She acknowledged the challenges of working in pediatrics but did not address the poor working conditions Duyvewaardt and others have described. 

“The situation at Kelowna General Hospital is a very difficult one and we are going to continue to do everything we can to fill those positions,” Osborne said. “It is a very tough situation for them. The burnout that they are experiencing, the moral distress that they are facing.”

To contact a reporter for this story, email Jesse Tomas or call 250-488-3065 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw. Find our Journalism Ethics policy here.

We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above. SUBSCRIBE to our awesome newsletter here.

News from © iNFOnews, 2025