Listowel Wingham Hospital Alliance CEO Karl Ellis says recent emergency department closures continue to be a trend all over the province.
He notes that locally, it normally wouldn't be an issue to miss some staff, but because of staffing pressures everywhere, it's become a regular problem.
"We have a relatively young staff and quite a number of people off on maternity and parental leave, and historically we would have been able to fill those jobs with temporary postings," Ellis said.
Ellis says bringing in foreign nurses and investing in better training and school uptake is a good solution in the long run, but in the immediate future, it won't help much yet, so ED closures will likely continue to be a regular thing.
"For a registered nurse it's university degree training, essentially four years, and then a period of time before they're comfortable working in a clinical setting like an emergency department, so the situation that we're facing right now is likely to extend for quite some time," added Ellis. "But also, we need to make sure we have housing available for people that want to move into our community, we need to have daycare available for young families. There's a number of things we need to work on together to support staff in healthcare."
Additionally, Ellis commented on hospital infrastructure funding that must be spent next year, which will go toward improvements at both the Listowel and Wingham hospitals. He says they already know what the money will go towards, starting in Listowel.
"Heating, ventilation and air conditioning, and that's a multi-year project so the money will just get us started on that project. In Wingham, we're hoping to replace a generator, and throughout the year, we replace things like windows and doors," Ellis shared.
