Canada’s Number One Suburban Newspaper VANCOUVER September 13, 19: NEWS photo Terry Peters JUST COUNTING the days until the sun shines again, this seal, ‘a regular visitor to his special spot in West Vancouver, is all ready to suntan, but the weather won't coo- perate. The seal has been frequenting a couple of special rocks for quite a while now and is looked on by area residents as a friend of the family, News photographer Terry Peters caught up with him just as he was getting comfy. Residents demand rec centre: “STARTLING” increases in the operational costs of Lions Gate Hospital are making it dif- ficult for administrators there to balance the budget. In a letter to staff dated - September 5, hospital presi- dent John Borthwick blamed increased drug costs and the survivial rate of critical pa- tients for pushing up the hospital’s operation § ex- penses. “Recently, Dr. (James) Corbett {LGH medical coordinator) prepared some material for the Medical Staff Advisory Committee. Some of the facts are so startling, 1 thought everyone would be interested,’’ Bor- thwick said. ‘‘They are the facts that make it increasing- ly difficult to balance our budget.” Borthwick went on to say that an improved ambulance service meant ‘‘more crit- ically il! and injured patients are surviving long enough to reach hospital.’’ “These become our inten- sive care patients,’ he said. The letter also blamed bed restrictions at other Van- couver hospitals for placing a higher demand on Lions Gate Hospital. “Fo compound the situa- tion, the Vancouver hospitals to which some of these cases (chronic obstruc- tive lung diseases requiring short term ventilation and more overdoses that require ventilation) were previously iransferred, can no longer accept them due to their own Balcony hazards: casts spell | PAGE 59 bed restrictions.”’ Hospital records show that to July 31, 1985 Lions Gate Hospital had the same number of ventilator days as in all of 1984. “And a ventilator case re- quires one-to-one nursing — a huge drain on the nursing budget,’’ Borthwick said. . Drug .costs have jumped 86 per cent between 1980/81 and 1984/85, while the drug budget allocated to anaesthetic gases increased by 403 per cent, due to in- creased costs and more surgery. “These trends are conti- nuing this year. And physi- cians are prescribing more drugs,’? Borthwick warned. New prescriptions in the first quarter of 1985 went up 12.6 pet cent over 1984,° while repeat prescriptions climbed 18.7 per cent. See Rising Page 11 Education quality concerns parents BRITISH Columbians are concerned about education. By TIMOTHY RENSSLAW | Those province-wide con- cerns paralleled by local concerns within North Van- couver’s District 44 were highlighted in a province survey Lets Talk About Schools and a local school district survey, the results of which were discussed at the board’s Tuesday night meeting. Calling it one of the most positive things to happen in education years, District 44 Superin- tendent of Schools Dr. Leo Marshull ran through a slide show presentation of what he considered to be the highlights from Let’s Talk About Schools. The survey, a five-booklet glossy print package costing approximately $100,000 to print, was undertaken by the B.C. Ministry of Education in conjunction with the Gallup polling organization in 1984, and was completed in the last few. in July 1985. The survey in- corporated input from 25,000 British Columbians from some 500 province- wide public meetings. In its parallel poll, the Gallup organization solicited input from 800 members of the public and 609 education professionals. After unemployment, which two-thirds of those polled by Gallup said was their number one concern, respondents ranked quality of education on the same See Schoo!