August 24, 2010	PDF format: [14 Kb]

BCNU President Debra McPherson will be in Prince George at 12 noon on Wednesday, August 25 to meet with local nurses and to speak out publicly about their ongoing patient safety concerns at the University Hospital of Northern BC.

UHNBC nurses have filed more than 250 Professional Responsibility Forms in the past two years in an attempt to warn the Northern Health Authority that patients are being placed at risk and nurses' professional standards of practice are being compromised. Most of the PRFs were filed by nurses working in critical care areas such as ER, ICU and surgical recovery. Despite the critical issues raised in those PRFs, management has done little to address the situation.

The 250 PRFs warn the NHA about continuously-low staffing levels; lack of beds; patients cared for in hallways and tub-rooms; understaffed units where nurses consistently work 16-hour shifts without breaks; ICU patients waiting in ER because of the lack of ICU beds, which leads to overcrowding in the UHNBC's emergency room; and inadequate support for ventilated patients.

"Prince George nurses have been trying to resolve these issues by filing PRFs," says BCNU President Debra McPherson. "Unfortunately, their concerns have been largely ignored by the NHA. Our nurses are now extremely frustrated that their voices continue to fall on deaf ears. That's why they've asked me to speak out on their behalf."

McPherson points out that UHNBC nurses have offered management numerous solutions to improve the situation for Prince George patients, including the development of a high-acuity step down unit; increasing the number of ICU beds from seven to 10 and providing appropriate RN staffing levels for the new ICU beds.

BCNU has also demanded that a frontline nurse and a BCNU steward be given a seat on the hospital's critical care working group, which was mandated to review changes to the delivery of critical care at the under-staffed facility.