The new data obtained by CTV News has shown that the number of Canadians leaving hospital emergency rooms without being seen is higher than initially reported earlier this month.

CTV News requested updated information for the year 2022-2023, which was not detailed in the latest Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) report. CIHI staff were able to reveal new figures, indicating that more than 1.3 million Canadians left the emergency department after seeking care during a 12-month period between April 1, 2022, and March 30, 2023.

This represents a 34 percent increase in the number of Canadians who were saved from long emergency wait times in one year compared to the 2021-2022 data, which reported 963,000.

This also means that among the 15.1 million Canadians who sought care in emergency units, 8.6 percent of them left without medical care. This is compared to 6.8 percent who left without being seen among the 14.1 million patients recorded in the emergency room in 2021-2022.

"Patients arriving at emergency departments across Canada sit in chaotic and overcrowded waiting rooms," wrote Dr. Katherine Farner, an emergency physician in Toronto and deputy editor of the Canadian Medical Association Journal, adding: "They feel frustrated by our inability to provide effective and timely care, and they leave."

She added, "What concerns me most is that some of the people who leave without being seen will become seriously ill or die because of the condition that made them seek care in the first place."