Less patient care at hospital, says nurses' union

Lisa Haslam-Stroud, president of the Ontario Nurses' Association, said the cuts will affect in-patient psychiatry, day surgery, operating rooms, surgical units, diabetes care, mental health and addictions, critical care, the hospital's family and child program, cancer treatment, care for eating disorders, and the endoscopy unit, which provides colonoscopies.

“There are thousands of hours that are being stripped from our patients,” Haslam-Stroud said. “They're really balancing their budgets on the backs of the registered nurses.”

Without a funding increase, Haslam-Stroud said Health Sciences North has joined the North Bay Regional Health Centre and the Sault Area Hospital with cuts to frontline workers.

“Generally across the province, the administrative cutbacks don't happen,” Haslam-Stroud said. “In fact, what we see is layer upon layer of additional moneys being invested in non-frontline services.”

She said reductions in nursing hours can actually cost hospitals more in the long run, because those cuts translate to longer lengths of stay for patients, more bedsores, higher incidences of blood clots and more cardiac arrests in hospital.

Hospital spokesperson Dan Lessard said Health Sciences North will look to reduce nursing hours by not filling existing vacancies, and reducing part-time, call-in and overtime hours.

“We will also use attrition and early retirement where appropriate, so we’re doing everything we can to avoid actually laying off people,” he said in an email to NorthernLife.ca.

Lessard also said that in some units nursing cuts will not result in fewer hours of patient care, because any lost nursing positions will be replaced by other health-care workers.

“So for example, we may be reducing hours of one type of health care worker in a unit, such as RNs (registered nurses), but replacing it with another category of health care worker, such as RPNs (registered practical nurses) or PSWs (personal support workers), and vice-versa,” he said.

“Those employees are represented by different unions, so while one union may have fewer hours or positions on its books, the other union actually gains positions, and there is no loss of hours in care to our patients, merely a change in who is providing that care.”

Haslam-Stroud said the end result is some positions will be filled by “less skilled health professionals.”