Again this summer, we came close to closing hospitals due to the shortage of medical imaging technologists. The bonuses granted by the Legault government helped avoid the worst by suppressing the exodus to Ontario and making it possible to recruit a few more technologists.
But until when?
As is often the case, the problem may have simply been shifted. Seven of the nine technologists at the Shawville and Maniwaki hospitals could leave their positions as early as September 9 to fill vacant positions in urban areas where the bonuses ($22,000 versus $18,000) are more attractive.
In short, we robbed Peter to pay Paul.
Intolerable risk
Both the senior management of the CISSS de l’Outaouais and the union ranks describe this lack of parity between the bonuses granted in urban areas and those granted in rural areas. I do not understand this decision by the Legault government either. The amounts involved are relatively minimal, while the consequences of an “discovery” of the Pontiac and Haute-Gatineau in terms of trauma would be dramatic.
The role of the Maniwaki and Shawville hospitals is to keep trauma patients alive and stabilize them (a road accident victim, for example) before they are evacuated to urban hospitals to receive more advanced care. “If I lose these service points (due to the shortage of technologists),” says CISSSO CEO Marc Bilodeau, “I greatly increase my pre-hospital time before arriving in a hospital setting. So it’s a significant risk for the population.”
An intolerable risk, I would add, especially since human lives in Haute-Gatineau or in the Pontiac are no less valuable than in an urban environment. What is the Quebec government waiting for to grant parity to technologists in the Outaouais?
Operating theatres at less than 50%
The other issue that greatly concerns the CEO of the CISSS de l’Outaouais these days is the operating rooms that are operating at less than 50% of their capacity, once again due to a lack of staff, especially nurses. At the Gatineau hospital, only one room out of seven is open in the operating room, a situation that the Liberal MP for Pontiac, André Fortin, rightly denounces. At the end of July, 1,464 patients had been waiting for surgery for over a year in Outaouais, one of the worst numbers in the province in proportion to the population…
Marc Bilodeau is not backing down on this point. “The issue of operating rooms remains,” says the CEO of the CISSSO. “All we managed to do this summer in the Gatineau operating room was to maintain our emergency surgeries, including obstetrical and oncology emergencies. But we were not able to eat into our waiting lists.”
The CEO of the CISSSO expects an improvement in September with the return from vacation of several “retirees” from the health system who have come back to lend a hand in the operating rooms. But in the longer term, the lack of operating platforms risks causing surgeons to flee to other climes. Some have already left the region to operate elsewhere.
CISSSO CEO, Dr. Marc Bilodeau, during an interview with The Law. (Patrick Woodbury/Le Droit)
“It’s a challenge that I have to work with my surgeons to find solutions and see how we can do better,” agrees Marc Bilodeau. “That necessarily involves recruiting additional staff to help us reopen operating rooms. It potentially involves strengthening other establishments in the network. That’s what will allow us to create momentum, keep our surgeons in place and, I hope, attract others…”
Difficult recruitment
During a long interview given to the Right This week, the CEO of the CISSSO talked a lot about recruiting workers. “My biggest challenge in the coming years will be to be able to hire in a context where the reputation of the Outaouais is not necessarily the brightest,” he said.
The CEO of the CISSSO will need all the help he can get from the Quebec government to reposition the CISSSO as an “employer of choice.” Salary disparities with the Ontario health care system and with the federal government are hurting the CISSSO. Not to mention the opening of the new Civic Hospital in Ottawa, scheduled for 2028, which will increase the already fierce competition for the recruitment of medical workers.
In this context, Mr. Bilodeau has made it his mission to revive hope among the people of Outaouais, the hope that their health care facility is there for them, and that it will continue to work for them. A big order…
“It’s super important to me,” he says. “I think the situation is reversible, otherwise I wouldn’t have accepted this role. It involves better management of resources internally, through retention of the workforce, in order to offer better services and better access. It’s about dangling a project for the future with the transformation of Santé Québec, with digital health records, with a new hospital that will allow us to reorganize care in the territory.”
Help from Quebec?
These beautiful messages, he said, must be conveyed in a positive manner, while remaining realistic. The fact remains that the CEO of the CISSSO will need all the help possible from Quebec to achieve this.
Health Minister Christian Dubé will have to provide the Outaouais with the tools and funding needed to deal with its special status as a border region. Despite its differences, the Outaouais must be able to perform like the other regions of Quebec. And that starts by granting parity in premiums for medical imaging technologists…
