Job Satisfaction and Retention Survey

Last week the PEI Health Sector Council announced the release of the Job Satisfaction and Retention Survey report. This report provides an analysis of job satisfaction and retention issues among the Registered Nurse (RN), Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN) and Resident Care Worker (RCW) occupational groups on Prince Edward Island. The Job Satisfaction and Retention Survey asked questions regarding place of work, years in practice, work schedule, work environment, wages, respect, scope of practice, performance review and retirement.

Exemplary Care: Registered Nurses and Licensed Practical Nurses Working Together

The Association of Registered Nurses of PEI, the Licensed Practical Nurses Association of PEI, and the PEI Health Sector Council today announced the release of Exemplary Care: Registered Nurses and Licensed Practical Nurses Working Together. This publication highlights the guiding principles shared among RNs and LPNs and clarifies some of the key differences between RNs and LPNs in clinical practice. The discussion and examples presented in the report reflect the practice of typical nurses and is intended to promote an understanding of:

• the scope of practice of each group,
• the practice expectations when both groups work together, and
• the contributions that both groups bring to the care setting.

Having a full understanding of the different health care contributions of RNs and LPNs will enhance and improve the process of collaboration and effective decision-making in the clinical setting.

RNs and LPNs are two health professions that work very closely together. This document represents an important milestone in fostering mutual knowledge-sharing and increased collaboration between the two professions to relieve some of the tremendous human resource pressures on the health system and create an exemplary health care workplace. A more efficient, collaborative nursing practice benefits all of us – nurses, other allied health professionals, and clients of the health system. An efficient, collaborative nursing practice enhances our ability to recruit and retain nurses and leads to better utilization of human resources and, consequently, savings in financial resources.

I hope you get a chance to read and comment on this document.

Cheers,
Mark

CUPE Article on RPNs' Scope of Practice in Ontario

The article reproduced below (find the original here) gives another perspective on an issue that’s very similar to the one affecting health facilities in rural communities on PEI. What’s your take? Do you think that some of the pressures facing rural hospitals and their emergency rooms in particular could be eased by expanding LPNs’ scope of practice as this article suggests? Are we even at a stage where we can consider expanding LPNs’ scope of practice when they are limited by their scope of employment?

RPNs can ease ER crisis at Huron Perth’s Seaforth – Another rural hospital cuts services as McGuinty government turns its back

January 28, 2009 11:09 AM

LONDON, Ont. – Expanding the scope of practice for Registered Practical Nurses (RPNs) can ease the Emergency Room (ER) crisis at Seaforth Community Hospital, says Michael Hurley, President of the Ontario Council of Hospital Unions OCHU/CUPE, which represents 40 workers at Seaforth. “We have to respond to the shortage of nurses,” Hurley says. “But cutting emergency room (ER) services is not an acceptable way to respond to inadequate resources or staffing.”

Hurley encouraged hospitals to expand the scope of practice of RPNs, graduates of a two-year program, to better serve the public.

“By realigning nursing duties across the Huron Perth Healthcare Alliance and using RPNs appropriately, we can address the nursing shortage at Seaforth,” Hurley says.
As of February 7, Seaforth Community Hospital will cut its 24-hour ER down to 12 hours, and remain open only from 8:00 AM to 8:00 PM. Hospital officials say that ambulances will be diverted to other hospitals during the shut-down times.

But Hurley warned that it is the chronic underfunding of the health system underlies ER closures at Seaforth, and elsewhere, and not just the nursing shortage.

“Cutting ER services is a direct response to the financial pressures on the health care system,” Hurley says. “This is yet another example of a rural hospital losing services in a wave of underfunding and restructuring that the McGuinty government is forcing onto hospitals.”

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Contact:
Michael Hurley, President, OCHU/CUPE, cell: 416.884.0770

David Robbins, CUPE Communications, cell: 613.878.1431