Also, a COVID-19 outbreak at Louise Marshall Hospital is putting extra strain on the system, says hospital president and CEO Angela Stanley. “Our staffing all summer at our facility has been precarious,” Stanley told CBC News. “Our staff, all clinical providers, direct care providers and indirect care providers, are extremely tired. They’ve been sacrificing for over two years now in terms of giving up vacation time, sacrificing time with their family and their friends. And they work a significant amount of overtime, dealing with patients who come in much sicker.” Stanley said the decision was not made lightly, but after realizing there were significant gaps in staffing, the hospital realized it would have to reduce hours. The hospital’s emergency department will close at 5pm ET on Saturday and reopen at 7am on Sunday. It will close again on Sunday at 5pm and reopen at 7am on Monday. The nearest emergency departments are in Palmerston, a 20-minute drive, Durham, 23 minutes away, or Listowel, a 32-minute drive from Mount Forest.
Last hospital to reduce hours
Mount Forest is the latest in a series of emergency department closings or downsizing across Ontario. It comes after Ontario Health released new numbers that showed high wait times and patient volumes in the province’s emergency departments in May. Clinton Public Hospital’s emergency department was temporarily closed over the Canada Day weekend due to shortages of nurses and doctors. This week, he had limited hours. It was open on Tuesday from 8am to 2pm Seaforth Community Hospital has reduced its emergency hours this week as well. It is open between 7 a.m. and 5 p.m. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, the Huron Perth Healthcare Alliance website says. The hospital’s emergency department in Mount Forest is just the latest in southern Ontario to announce reduced hours due to staff shortages. (Mike Symington/CBC) Also, hospitals in Wingham, Listowel and Chesley reduced their opening hours last weekend. “All efforts to locate staff for the emergency department have been unsuccessful,” South Bruce Gray Health Center posted on its website about Chesley Hospital. Mary Cardinal, vice president, people and chief quality officer of the Huron Perth Healthcare Alliance, said in a statement on the website that she has heard concerns about reduced services. “These are not isolated incidents and hospitals across the province are facing the same challenges,” Cardinal said. Jimmy Trieu, president and CEO of Alexandra Marie and General Hospital in Goderich and the South Huron Hospital Association, said one issue is that over the past four years, many health workers have retired and one in five hospital staff in the province is over 50 years old. Those who have left the profession cited the pandemic and burnout as top reasons. “It’s going to be a tough summer because of staffing pressures,” Trieu said in the press release.
Blaming vaccine forces ‘diversion’ from real problems: CEO
Stanley agreed that it’s not an isolated situation, and staffing was an issue even before the COVID-19 pandemic. “It’s been around for many years. COVID has just exacerbated the problems we’re facing,” he said. Stanley noted that she’s heard people comment that hospitals need to rehire health care workers who chose not to get the COVID-19 vaccine, but she says that’s not the problem. “We’ve only had one nurse choose to leave as a result of the mandatory vaccine. So it’s not really an issue,” Stanley said. “I think it’s a distraction from the issues we’re dealing with. We’re wasting time talking about it when we should really be problem solving and talking about what we know is causing these vacancies and turnover and staff leaving health Care.” Stanley asked the community for their continued support and patience in the coming weeks. “We are experiencing more and more concerns and behaviors from patients that we see are increasing the stress on our clinicians trying to care for them,” he added. “The biggest thing I can ask for, especially this weekend right now, is patience and continued support.”
