‘It delayed me conceiving for two years’: Windsor-Essex patients facing long waits for MRI, CT scans amid staffing shortage

Many in the region are seeing lengthy wait times for MRI scans and ultrasounds. CTV Windsor’s Travis Fortnum finds out why.

When Briea Beausoleil learned she needed surgery to correct a uterine septum – a procedure her doctor believed could explain her three miscarriages – she hoped an MRI to confirm the diagnosis would come quickly.

It didn’t.

Beausoleil,33, waited two full years for an MRI appointment in Windsor-Essex.

Without it, the surgery couldn’t move ahead.

“Honestly, it just… can I do this?” she said.

“I know what I want to do. I want to have kids. I need this to have kids. And just waiting for that call, that anticipation… and then the constant disappointment being like, okay, this is when I’m going to get it. No, no you’re not.”

Her experience reflects a broader problem across Windsor-Essex: long waits for non-urgent diagnostic imaging such as CT scans and MRIs, driven not by equipment shortages – but by a lack of staff qualified to run them.

Months-long waits — and sometimes more than a year

Windsor Regional Hospital confirms routine MRI and CT wait times can stretch from one year to 18 months, depending on demand and staffing.

Most other diagnostic imaging at the hospital only see waits of a few weeks.

Nicole Krywionek, the hospital’s Chief Nursing Executive and Vice-President of Diagnostic Imaging, says CT and MRI departments are carrying vacancies they can’t yet fill.

“If people are looking to get them done in Windsor, there is some staffing issues for CT and MRI vacancies, which is impacting wait times for routine procedures,” she said.

Urgent and emergent cases are still being completed within provincial targets, she noted.

It’s routine scans – including many needed to advance treatment plans – that face significant delays.

A limited pool of technologists

Krywionek says Windsor-Essex is in a challenging position: there is no local training program for CT or MRI technologists.

While St. Clair College trains ultrasound technologists – meaning WRH has few to no ultrasound vacancies – other diagnostic imaging fields rely on graduates from programs in the GTA and beyond.

Krywionek says that distance matters.

“We get work placements from outside-of-region schools because there’s a limited number of placements in the province,” she said.

“But getting those students to stay in Windsor-Essex when they have family and a life outside of here… it is difficult to entice them.”

The issue isn’t unique to Windsor.

“There is a provincial need in this area,” Krywionek said.

“Even areas that do have those schools do see vacancies and have difficulty recruiting.”

Clinics competing with hospitals — and with Michigan

The shortage spans the entire system — not just hospitals.

Clear Medical Imaging, one of the region’s largest community providers, is also struggling to hire technologists.

“If somebody came to me today, I’ll hire them,” said CEO Michael Reinkober.

“For sure I could hire five X-ray techs and five ultrasound techs, but to be honest I would hire more.”

Clear Medical is offering a $30,000 signing bonus.

Windsor Regional Hospital is offering up to $25,000.

Reinkober says clinics face even more pressure as Michigan health systems recruit directly in Windsor.

He says Clear is using every tool it can, including a recruiting firm and early outreach.

“We even got plugged in at the high school level to do a little bit of an educational roadshow,” he said.

“Because I don’t know that students necessarily know the career opportunities that exist in medical imaging. You know, they’re good-paying jobs.”

Krywionek agrees that many students simply don’t know these jobs exist.

“Even myself, when I was looking to get into healthcare, this is not as well known of a job that’s available for people,” she said.

A personal cost

For Beausoleil, the wait became too long – and too costly.

Worried about her timeline for starting a family, she found a specialist in Toronto and travelled repeatedly for care.

After months of appointments and travel, she finally received her MRI in Toronto late last year and now has a surgery date.

“Just that elation feeling of being like, okay, we’re finally onto the next step,” she said.

“My goal of having my own child is getting closer and closer.”

But she knows others may not have the resources to travel.

“A lot of girls I’ve met who have the same issue as I do in Windsor… they can’t travel,” she said.

“They don’t have the funds, they don’t have the time.”

Beausoleil says the long waits – and the lack of staff driving them – have cost her years she can’t get back.

“It delayed me conceiving for two years, minimum,” she said.