Residents in Swan Hill have expressed concern that the lack of a doctor in their community may put lives in jeopardy.

According to those in the community, the town’s only doctor has taken a six-week holiday and Alberta Health Services (AHS) has not employed a replacement.

“Six weeks without a doctor is a long time,” resident Scott Berry said.

“We have between 500 and 600 workers within a 50 miles radius daily working here.”

“AHS knew about this for nine months,” Swan Hills resident and mother of four, Candace Hickie explained.

Hickie said that if anyone in the community needed to see a physician they would have to travel to Whitecourt, which is 45 minutes away.

“That’s a far drive when you have an emergency.”

Something that was put into perspective when Henry Bourque hit a moose while driving home last week.

Bourque was taken to Swan Hills by ambulance but had to wait another hour and a half to be taken to Whitecourt.

“Nobody could give me pain killers, because they said in order to prescribe pain killers you need to be a paramedic level or higher, and all of our ambulance drivers are only EMTs,” he told CTV News.

He explained he spent about 16 hours travelling in several ambulances before he arrived in Edmonton and treated for a broken neck.

“This is just unacceptable and whoever made these decisions to go with this has to really look because this isn’t right.”

AHS said the hospital in Swan Hills was still open and that nurses and EMTs as well as Telehealth services were still available.

Officials also said they can’t force a doctor to relocate, even temporarily, to a community.

They added that serious trauma cases would not be treated at Swan Hills whether a physician was there or not.

However, Berry said having a doctor at the hospital could still save lives.

“They don’t necessarily treat trauma here but they stabilize people until STARS can arrive or they transfer them to other places.”

AHS said they were planning on hiring a second doctor for the community in the fall.

Residents said while that didn’t help them right now they were still happy they won’t be without a doctor in the future.

With files from Amanda Anderson