Out-of-province nurses cost Halifax hospitals $900K in 11 months

Halifax hospitals spent nearly $900,000 in eleven months bringing in out-of-province nurses to cover shortages in four units, according to invoices released to a union.

The Nova Scotia Government & General Employees Union claims the money could have been better spent elsewhere.

"We have a crisis in nursing and what they aren't doing is focusing on recruiting and keeping nurses here in the province," Jason MacLean, the president of the NSGEU, told CBC News.

"They are spending the money elsewhere."

'An expensive proposition'

But the Nova Scotia Health Authority says the "temporary" move kept intensive care beds open, enabled staff nurses to get vacations and even saved money on overtime.

"It was an expensive proposition but it did service our purposes," says Bruce English, director of recruiting and staffing for the central zone of the Nova Scotia Health Authority.

The authority announced last February it was bringing in a dozen so-called travel nurses because of a spike in retirements in critical care units.

Hourly rates almost double staff rates

A company based in Burnaby, B.C. Select Medical Connections supplied the nurses.

Billings released to the NSGEU through a freedom of information request show company nurses billed for 10,922 regular hours and 147 hours of overtime between April 2015 and February 2016.

The total cost of wages was about $780,000, with $75,000 spent on accommodations, $12,000 for flights and $11,000 for mileage.

Rates blacked out

The hourly rate was blacked out in 168 invoices released to the union, but in one invoice the rate was left uncovered and showed travel nurses were paid $70 an hour and $105 for overtime. The health authority has confirmed the hourly costs.

The Nova Scotia Government & General Employees Union said the rate paid to travel nurses is almost double that of staff nurses in the units.

Staff shortages decreasing

English says the situation that led to the hiring of travel nurses has eased with recruitment and graduation of nurses trained to work in intensive care settings.

"There's always a patient at the back of this. We were able to keep open beds, we were able to provide services to patients," he said.

English said the health authority has never stopped trying to recruit nurses and the wave of retirements that prompted contracting Select Medical Connections was "unprecedented."

There are no travel nurses currently working at the Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre in Halifax, nor are there plans to hire any in the future, says English. He did not rule out hiring travel nurses if conditions change.

"We might use them, but right now we don't have any plans."