Province has 'cheated' city out of 234 hospital nurses, union leader says - Infomart - 0 views
-
Windsor Star Fri Aug 5 2016
-
A "growing and enormous" $4.8-billion funding gap is to blame for declining care in Ontario's acute-care hospitals, says the president of the Ontario Council of Hospital Unions. The damage for Windsor amounts to 234 fewer hospital nurses, 696 fewer hospital staff and a $74-million funding shortfall, when you compare Ontario's per-capita hospital funding to the funding in the rest of Canada's provinces, according to the union.
-
"You are being cheated out of the equivalent of 234 nurses, RNs and RPNs," Michael Hurley said at a news conference Thursday at the Royal Canadian Legion Branch 255 in Riverside. The funding for acute hospitals has dropped so below other provinces that patients in Ontario receive six fewer hours of nursing care, he said. And the result is fewer hospital beds and higher rates of medical errors, hospital-sourced infections, and readmission of patients who were sent home too early. "People don't get the attention they need when they're in a health crisis," said Hurley. "All these things together are the explanation for the backlogs and waits people experience when they go to the hospital." Hurley's union, CUPE, represents about 600 staffat Windsor's two hospitals - non-acute Hotel-Dieu Grace Healthcare and acute care Windsor Regional Hospital, which earlier this year cited a $20-million budget shortfall as it announced the elimination of 166 full-time equivalent positions, most of those RNs (169 full-and part-time positions according to their union). However, 80 of those FTEs are being replaced by 80 RPNs. Before the cuts, the hospital had about 1,550 RNs.
- ...5 more annotations...