Surgical staff are feeling effects of staffing shortage
Kirsten Murphy
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Feb 28/01) - The mood among some Stanton Regional Hospital surgical nurses remains tense nine months after the 14-bed surgical ward closed.
"From the meetings I've attended ... surgical nurses desperately want the ward re-opened," said Dr. David Cook, Stanton's chief of surgery.
"You don't have cohesive surgical nursing teams working together. It's very stressful for some of them."
Minor surgeries have continued at the hospital, with patients recovering on pediatric, medicine and obstetric wards.
Ward closed in June
The 14-bed ward closed last June for three months, as it routinely does. Instead of reopening the ward in the fall, administration decided to merge the surgical and pediatrics wards to save an estimated $350,000. The need for cost-cutting stemmed from the hospital's $1.3-million deficit in 1999.
After an outcry from staff and doctors, who weren't consulted doctors, said patients' health was threatened, the merger decision was reversed. The ward was to reopen upon the hiring of new staff.
The hospital's hiring drive has been successful to a point, but not enough to reopen the ward. Cook said it is difficult to compete with other Canadian and American hospitals for nursing staff.
Cook sits on a 25-person task force which set March 5 as a possible re-opening date.
"It was an arbitrary date. Basically the surgeons felt the longer this ward stays closed, the less likely it is to open," he said. Another date has yet to be set.
Numbers not released
Last month, hospital administrator Dennis Cleaver said five more nurses need to be hired. Task force member and hospital spokesperson Heather Chang would not say how many more nurses are needed now.
"It's a moving target, it moves from day to day. What I tell you today could change by the afternoon," Chang said. "We're shooting ourselves in the foot by giving out numbers."
Partially closing the pediatric ward to re-open the surgery ward was recently mentioned by Health and Social Services Minister Jane Groenewegen in the legislature. The scenario is unlikely, Cook said. "We have no desire to create havoc," he said. "There was no firm plan set. We were simply considering all possible solutions."
Surgeon Chris Blewett was recently critical of the ward closure, stating surgical patients were not receiving the appropriate care.
Cook noted his colleagues' concern but said staff is working to the best of their ability and with the resources they have.
"The bottom line is we need nurses."
