CALEB NICKERSON
SHAWVILLE Dec. 4, 2019
This past weekend, the obstetrics department at Pontiac Community Hospital (PCH) experienced another . . .
break in service, the ninth in the past two months.
The break lasted from Friday at 4 p.m. to Monday at 8 a.m. and was caused by a lack of nursing staff. Last week, Radio-Canada/CBC published a story where one of the nurses in the unit spoke out anonymously about the working conditions in the obstetrics unit and pleaded for local officials and the Centre integré de santé et services sociaux de l’Outaouais (CISSSO) to do something.
According to data The Equity obtained from CISSSO, the problem isn’t limited to the obstetrics department, but is system-wide. Overtime hours and compensation for all workers at PCH have nearly quadrupled in five years, rising from 5,718.14 hours ($256,958.07) in 2014 to 21,917.32 ($969,074.18) in 2019.
When The Equity followed up by requesting a more detailed breakdown, as well as data from other regional hospitals to compare with, CISSSO spokesperson Marie-Pier Després responded a week later by redirecting the request to their access to information department. When asked for comment on why overtime has increased so drastically, Després said that it was a systemic issue across the region.
The Equity spoke with a source at PCH with extensive knowledge of the situation, who also requested anonymity, and they said that the short-staffing has noticeably escalated in the past two years.
“That’s everywhere, it’s not just nurses, it’s ward aides, kitchen staff, cleaning staff, it’s secretaries, there’s not enough bodies for all of these services,” they said. “So yes a lot of the time when somebody’s working, it’s overtime, they’ve already put in their hours.”
The source spoke highly of all the current staff shouldering the extra workload, but said a solution needs to be found immediately. One thing that the source stressed is that mandatory overtime has never been implemented at PCH, as it’s an extremely unpopular option that would cause even more staff to depart.
“We don’t want to go there, compared to the city,” they said. “If we continue getting this pressure, from all around, we’re going to have to do it, and when we do it, we’re going to lose more people because nobody wants to be forced to do overtime. All this pressure there, it’s just going to backfire.”
The source expressed frustration that all the negative news the hospital has received was creating a self-perpetuating cycle, by scaring away potential hires and putting a “dark cloud” over the facility. They said more focus needs to be put on all the good work that health care workers are accomplishing in spite of the short-staffing.
“I’m going to tell you, I will never bash our hospital, I love our hospital too much,” they said. “The [nurses] are working very hard … Everyone’s concentrating obstetrics, obstetrics, obstetrics, they’re forgetting that it’s not just obstetrics that’s suffering here, it’s the whole floor, it’s the emergency department, it’s everywhere.”
On Nov. 29, Health Minister Danielle McCann announced that the government and the province’s federation of medical specialists had formed a team of specialists to limit service interruptions at various rural hospitals across Quebec, including PCH.
The source at PCH said that the team could provide some relief, especially after two specialists announced they would be departing at the end of December, but still does not address the shortage of nurses.
