– Kjerkol closes his ears to the warning calls from the employees and swallows raw the unrealistic descriptions from the boards of the hospitals and healthcare institutions.
This is what health policy spokesperson in Rødt, Seher Aydar, tells Dagbladet.
Recently, more and more people have sounded the alarm about the staffing situation at Norwegian hospitals.
Monday wrote NRK that the low staffing at Ahus means that the conservation officer here now does the same. It is after doctors have told of how they go home from work in tears, wish they were ill or to be hit with “lighter” injuries in order to escape the harsh guards.
The problem they point to is the same: They cannot bear the stress caused by low staffing.
– Gotta clean up
Now both Rødt and SV are demanding that Health Minister Ingvild Kjerkol (Ap) come up with clear measures to improve the situation.
Mass layoffs
– That people die is common in a hospital. But that they die because you don’t have time to do your job or are somewhere else, that’s the big fear, says senior doctor in orthopedics at Ahus, Erik Engebretsen, to NRK.
The alarm at Ahus is just the latest in a long series of warnings about the situation in the hospitals.
At Ullevål Hospital, 14 out of 24 nurses in the thoracic surgery department have resigned in protest over what is described as “long-term frustrations and great uncertainty” related to holiday closures, financial cuts and the planned merger of several heart and lung departments.
– It is difficult to understand that mass dismissals and shouts of warning from professional circles do not make an impression on the person who is ultimately responsible, says Aydar to Dagbladet.
She gets support from SV’s spokesperson for health policy, Marian Hussein.
– The situation is serious and acute, and so far all we hear is that healthcare personnel must work faster and run faster, says Hussein to Dagbladet.
– Several redundancies ready
Hussein believes that the shouts from the employees show that we are in an urgent situation.
– Now we wake up every morning to new stories about how demanding it is to work in public healthcare. Then the minister must come to the scene with a completely different set of instruments than what we see today.
– Now is not the time to wait, or to send unclear demands, we need action and assurances that it will now be better to work in the public healthcare system, she continues.
– Two descriptions of reality
Aydar believes that the employees’ descriptions of the cuts, and what is served to you by the management and repeated by Kjerkol, are two completely different descriptions of reality.
– While the board of OUS talks about harmonisation, profit realization and staffing adaptation, the employees respond with mass redundancies and tell of fears for patient safety and unreasonably high work pressure, says Aydar.
She believes that trust in the management of the hospitals in Oslo is now worn thin.
– In the midst of a health personnel crisis, job number one must be to take care of the people we have. Then we cannot treat them as machines that can be moved around as it suits and run at a higher speed if necessary. The professionals are the gold in the hospitals.
Right: – Calls for Minister of Health
Pointing to the hospitals
Dagbladet has submitted the criticism in this case to Health Minister Ingvild Kjerkol, but has not yet received a reply.
To NTB, she stated the following about the situation at the thoracic surgery department at Ullevål:
– It is obviously a demanding situation that has arisen at Oslo University Hospital, in that so many important employees have resigned from one and the same department.
Kjerkol continued that the case must be handled by Oslo University Hospital, which has both employer responsibility and responsibility for proper services to the population.
– The hospital must, possibly in collaboration with Helse Sør-East, find solutions that provide a sound service offer to the population in the future as well.
