A Saskatchewan man is speaking out after his stroke-stricken mother spent three days in the hallway of Saskatoon’s Royal University Hospital (RUH), describing the conditions as “atrocious” and lacking basic dignity.
Tim Lang, who lives in Unity, about 170 kilometres west of Saskatoon, said he counted hundreds of people passing by his mother’s bed each day. “You’ve got a stroke victim lying in a hallway where 500 people a day walk past your bed. It was just brutal,” Lang told reporters. He added that the hallway reeked of urine and that patients who had soiled themselves were left nearby without adequate cleaning.
Lang said the constant traffic prevented his mother from sleeping, which complicated her medical assessments. Once she was moved to a private room, her condition improved significantly. She has since been transferred to a hospital in Unity and is recovering.
The case comes after viral social media videos showed crowded hallways at RUH. John Ash, vice-president of integrated Saskatoon health with the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA), admitted the hospital had reached a breaking point but insisted the worst has passed. At the peak last week, 42 patients were waiting for an in-patient bed.
Ash said the SHA is adding 109 new beds in Saskatoon to ease capacity pressures, with 20 already open. He attributed the crisis partly to an early start to flu season. “Your ultimate goal is we don’t want to have patients waiting in the hallways,” Ash said.
Opposition NDP health critic Keith Jorgenson called the situation “unacceptable” and said the videos expose a “broken” health-care system.
Lang remains outraged. He believes many patients in the hospital were struggling with addiction and should be treated in specialized facilities rather than crowding hospital wards. “The cleanliness in there was atrocious,” he repeated. “And the smell was atrocious.”
For families like Lang’s, the experience has left a lasting impression — one that raises questions about dignity, access, and accountability in Saskatchewan’s health-care system.
