Dr. Helmcken Memorial Hospital in Clearwater/via Interior Health

The emergency room at the Dr. Helmcken Memorial Hospital in Clearwater will be closed for 13 hours this Tuesday, Sept. 17, because of a lack of nurses.

Interior Health says the Clearwater ER will be closed between 6 a.m. and 7 p.m. with people being told to head to Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops or 100 Mile House District General Hospital during that time.

This is the eighth ER closure in Clearwater this year, and first since late July.

Back in June, Clearwater Mayor Merlin Blackwell was bracing for rotating ER closures this summer as efforts were underway to hire at least five new nurses.

“We need two nurses to be out of diversions, four to be stable, six we will be basically fully staffed,” Blackwell said, in a late July tweet thread. “Our hospital team is doing this now with awesome nurses from other hospitals, agency nurses, and locums. A local high school grad just joined the nursing team. We can solve it.”

At this time though, it is not clear if this ER closure in Clearwater will be a one-off, or the first in a series of closures.

“Nurses and [doctors], and other [healthcare workers] need and deserve holidays. Many have been picking up extra shifts or working overtime for years,” Blackwell added in his thread.

“If your ER closes, please don’t publicly blame or shame nurses for it because they are on a holiday.”

As has been the case during past emergency room closures, Interior Health says people in Clearwater who need life-saving emergency care should call 9-1-1.

People who aren’t sure if they need to head to the emergency room are being told to contact HealthLink BC.