Quebec adds health-care workers to help fill Outaouais staff shortages

Western Quebec's health authority has starting sending extra health-care workers into different areas to help with staffing shortages.  (Radio-Canada - image credit)
Western Quebec's health authority has starting sending extra health-care workers into different areas to help with staffing shortages. (Radio-Canada - image credit)

A small number of health-care professionals has been deployed as an added staffing boost to some hospitals, long-term care homes and clinics in the Outaouais region.

The Centre intégré de santé et de services sociaux de l'Outaouais (CISSSO), western Quebec's health authority, sent seven health-care workers earlier this month to CHSLD de la Petite-Nation, a long-term care home, east of Gatineau.

Starting Monday, two new auxiliary nurses will be lending a hand at the Foyer Père-Guinard, a long-term care home in Maniwaki, Que., said Camille Brochu-Lafrance, a spokesperson for CISSSO.

Another auxiliary nurse is expected in the region in the beginning of November in a sector which remains to be determined, she added.

In May, the Quebec government announced it would create a "flying squad" to address the shortage of health-care workers in some regions of the province.

Earlier in the summer, CISSSO said it needed nurses and nursing assistants for emergency, operating room, surgical unit and intensive care sectors, with CEO Marc Bilodeau saying he was preparing for the "worst-case scenario."

Bilodeau added that staffing had not recovered to pre-pandemic levels.

Karine D'Auteuil, president of the Syndicat des professionnelles en soins de l'Outaouais, a local nurses union, said the recent deployments are a step in the right direction but that "we must not [declare] victory."

"We must continue to work on recruitment. The shortage in Outaouais is critical," she said in French.