Staffing shortages continue at Sudbury, Ont., hospital, but it's getting better, says CEO

The Health Sciences North hospital in Sudbury, Ont. continues to face staffing shortages and long surgery wait lists, but the situation is improving, according to outgoing president and CEO Dominic Giroux.

At the hospital's annual general meeting Tuesday,Giroux said that since mid-July, they've been short an average of 30 registered nurses, nine registered practical nurses and six personal support workers on day and night shifts combined.

"While it remains a very challenging situation, trends have been improving the last few months," he said.

"We have recruited 845 employees during the last fiscal year, while 507 left the organization."

Giroux said the hospital was able to perform 15,113 surgeries in the last year, which was more than in the previous two years, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But it remained fewer than the 15,846 surgeries in 2019-2020.

Giroux said there are currently 4,637 patients on Health Sciences North's surgical wait list, and 147 of them are on itfor cancer surgeries. But he added that's an improvement from the peak in January, when 5,263 people were on the wait list.

As with the rest of Ontario, the hospital's wait times at the emergency department "have risen dramatically in the past year," Giroux said.

"Having an admitted patient wait 20, 30 or 40 hours in the emergency department for an inpatient bed is not safe, it's not patient-centred and it's not acceptable," he said.

Dealing with addictions

Dr. Tara Leary, the hospital's regional addictions physician lead, said her team treated 447 opioid overdoses last year.

"We see it in the news every day. Our health unit has an overdose death rate of nearly triple the provincial average," she said at the annual general meeting.

Leary said around 25 per cent of repeat substance use visits at the hospital are from people addicted to opioids, but half are for alcohol addiction.

"We're faced with a population that struggles with a variety of substances," she said.

Leary said Health Sciences North's specialized addictions medicine unit opened in 2021, and has since cared for 1,200 patients.

Caring for an aging population

Dr. Jo-Anne Clarke, medical director of the North East Specialized Geriatric Centre, also spoke at the meeting about the region's aging populationand the need for medical professionals to adapt to that reality.

A person born today can expect to live to age 84, Clarke said.

Because people are living longer, they are more likely to face chronic conditions and dementia as they age.

"Rates of dementia are going to be doubling in the next eight years and tripling in the next 30, and this will be the population that we will be caring for," Clarke said.

"And so far, we haven't changed how we provide care or how we train our health force."

Clarke said health-care professionals will need to look at everything that affects an older patient's quality of life, from their ability to walk and get around, to working closely with their family caregivers.

"These are the things that improve independence and quality of life," she said.