It’s no secret that Ontario is in the middle of a health human resource crisis, but people who work in the field are feeling optimistic about what the future holds on the other side of the pandemic.
Sara Lankshear, associate dean of nursing programs at Georgian College and a nurse for more than 35 years, told BarrieToday the number of applicants the college’s new standalone, four-year bachelor of science in nursing degree received in its first year is a positive sign.
“People are still very interested in having a career as a registered nurse, or a practical nurse. (Both programs) are always full," she said. "That to us says the pipeline is quite healthy. We are not seeing people move away from the profession as there’s a very high interest in people wanting to have a career in health.”
In its first year, the program had 150 seats available, and all were filled. That included 120 at the Barrie campus and 30 at the Owen Sound campus.
“We had well over 700 applications, " said Lankshear, adding officials are excited with the fact that the majority of students were, in fact, local to the region.
“They’re coming from Simcoe and they’re coming from Grey-Bruce. So the notion of who we wanted to attract … individuals who are living here and who want to get their degree here, we are very happy with what we are seeing so far," she added.
Lankshear said instructors have worked hard to build a curriculum that makes students as practice-ready as possible, so when the time comes, they are prepared for the reality of the job.
“Between the curriculum we’ve developed, which really focuses on the needs of the distinct communities, as well as their labs … (we want) to develop some confidence and competence," she said. "The third piece of that puzzle is the clinical placement. That gets all of those three things together and really support them to be practice ready.”
As for what she hopes to see for the field moving into the future, Lankshear said the pandemic enabled a lot of organizations to look at innovative roles and models of care.
“I think there are great opportunities for nurses to practice in what may have been a non-traditional practice setting to really function to the full scope of their practice,” she said. “We are still in the pandemic and now we are worried about flu, but I think once we have the chance to perhaps broaden our peripheral vision yet again.
"I see there are huge opportunities for nursing to really contribute to the health and wellness of a variety of communities and the health-care system right across the various sectors. I am very, very hopeful," Lankshear added.
A recent announcement by the Ontario government that it will be investing over $4.6 million in the Michener Institute to remove financial barriers for nurses wanting to up-skill to work in critical care areas of hospitals also comes as welcome news to local hospital officials.
The funding provides free tuition for students and all college and hospital costs, including back-filling their current roles to ensure continuity of care, and allows (already working) nurses to train to work in critical care areas of hospitals. By the spring of 2023, close to 600 registered nurses will have completed their up-skilling education and will be ready to support critical care in hospitals across the province, according to the provincial government.
In addition to the Michener Institute, the province is also investing more than $9.4 million to support accelerated critical care nursing at Centennial College, Conestoga College, George Brown College, Laurentian University, Mohawk College, and St. Lawrence College.
Although Georgian College is not included on that list, the increase in opportunities for online learning will allow nurses working at Royal Victoria Regional Health Centre (RVH) in Barrie to take advantage of the funding, acknowledged Darrell Sewell, who is the the hospital’s vice-president of people experience and chief human resources officer.
“This is fantastic news that the province is providing some additional funding and partnering with our academic partners to really expedite and break down those barriers to get more med-surg (medical-surgery) nurses certified in critical care,” he told BarrieToday. “While it won’t be as convenient for some of our RVH nurses to reach out and start this program so they can up-skill and then work in critical care … our nurses have reached out to some of those other colleges.
"We will certainly be highlighting this for our nurses to bring it to their attention and encourage them to make applications so that we will then internally have more of our med-surg nurses up-skilling to go into critical care areas," Sewell added.
While Sewell says this will require hospitals to back-fill positions while nursing staff undertake the new training, the short-term challenge it will create will be worth it for “longer term gain.”
Currently, the vacancy rate for all nursing categories at RVH sits at about 11 per cent, he explained, adding the vacancy rate for registered practical nurses (RPN) is slightly higher, sitting at 13.5 per cent, while the vacancy rate for registered nurses (RN) is 10.5 per cent.
“When you dig a little deeper and look specifically at critical care nurses … that is faring a bit better, with a current vacancy rate of approximately six per cent, but that can fluctuate quickly,” said Sewell, adding RVH is faring a bit better in terms of staffing levels than some of its counterparts around the province.
“We definitely have a health human resources supply problem going on … but I would say proportionally RVH is fairing a little bit better than some other health partners in the province. That doesn’t mean we aren’t always actively looking to recruit health-care professionals, and in particular nurses," he said.
In an effort to address that, Sewell said the hospital is always working to fill positions throughout the facility, noting in the past 30 months, they have been successful in its recruiting efforts, having filled 2,160 positions in all classifications of workers throughout the hospital.
Through the clinical side, the Barrie hospital also plans on introducing new models of care, he added, where they will look at full scopes of practices for different classifications of health-care workers.
