Dozens of nursing vacancies at both the Health Sciences and St. Clare’s ERs are part of a recent advisory from Eastern Health asking people not to turn up at capital city ERs unless they were facing a serious emergency.
Registered Nurses Union President Yvette Coffey calls the Emergency Department a “boiling point” with 20 or more patients admitted between the two hospitals on any given day, with no beds available. She says nurses are leaving the ERs in droves.
She says there are at least 19 Registered Nurse vacancies at the Health Sciences Emergency, and a number of vacancies at St. Clare’s Emergency as well. Some RNs are resigning and leaving the province, some are resigning to work for agencies, while others are going casual.
Coffey says demand has increased because of a lack of primary health care professionals like family physicians and nurse practitioners. Not to mention recent temporary ER closures in places like Whitbourne.
She says they have a meeting with the Department of Health later this month to discuss funding models for nurse practitioners, “but it needs to happen yesterday.”