| "There is less money coming into LHSC than two
years ago," said McKenna, whose local represents 1,400 nurses at LHSC and elsewhere
in the region. "Acute-care nurses are looking after sicker patients and sending home sicker patients than ever before to an uncertain setting. Who will care for them, how will they be followed up, where are the checks and balances?" she asked. |
A poll released yesterday by the Ontario Nurses Association indicates 95 per cent of Southwestern Ontario residents are "alarmed" by health funding cuts, 74 per cent believe cuts have put lives at risk and 81 per cent believe the quality of care has fallen over the past two years. Local pessimism was higher on all three issues than elsewhere in Ontario. The poll of 655 Ontarians by ComQuest of Toronto is considered accurate 19 times out of 20, plus or minus 3.8 per cent. Worry is pronounced in the southwest because the accelerated pace of restructuring has made bed shortages, cancelled surgeries and inadequate post-hospital care more apparent, said Barb Conlon, an ONA director and nurse at St. Joseph's Health Centre in London. "I see the fear in patients' eyes when they come to the hospital -- first of all that they have to come to the hospital and that at what is going to happen to them when they go home . . . ," said the 27-year nursing veteran. "We are seeing an increase in the alarm rate that people are having in reaction to the cuts in funding and to the fact the quality of health care has worsened over the past two years." In the poll, Southwestern Ontario includes Windsor, which led the way with restructuring; London, which faces the closing of two psychiatric hospitals and which fought a messy battle with Queen's Park over restructuring costs; Hamilton, where clogged emergency rooms have been an issue for two years; and Kitchener-Waterloo, where St. Mary's Hospital redirected ambulances to Grand River Hospital 20 times in the first 17 days of October, says the ONA. Mike Mullin, president of ONA local 45, representing about 850 nurses at St. Joseph's (down from 1,100 three years ago), said the public is more alarmed in areas such as London, where final restructuring orders have been given. "We know what's going to transpire in the London area -- we have critical-care bed shortages virtually on a daily basis and these result in cancellations of surgery." The poll confirms what front-line nurses are saying, said Vicki McKenna, president of ONA local 100 -- the public is worried, likely because of recent experience with the health system. Premier Mike Harris has said the Tory government has increased health-care spending and accusations about cutbacks are wrong. But McKenna disputes the claim. "There is less money coming into LHSC than two years ago," said McKenna, whose local represents 1,400 nurses at LHSC and elsewhere in the region. "Acute-care nurses are looking after sicker patients and sending home sicker patients than ever before to an uncertain setting. Who will care for them, how will they be followed up, where are the checks and balances?" she asked. |
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