Hundreds of nurses took to the streets of downtown Vancouver Wednesday to call attention to what they say is a health-care system in crisis thanks, in part, to understaffing, emergency room closures and long wait times for patients to get the care they need.
“We’re always short-staffed,” said Marcela Bonilla, who works as a community care nurse on the Downtown Eastside.
“There’s not enough people to help deliver safe care or proper care, or have the time to properly interact with the patient.”
The march came as nurses gathered this week at the Vancouver Convention Centre to elect a bargaining committee and identify key priorities as they prepare to negotiate a new collective bargaining agreement.
“Nurses deserve better,” said BC Nurses Union president Aman Grewal.
“Our patients in B.C. deserve better. The health-care system is in crisis and they need to listen to the nurses.”
Unionized nurses have been working without a contract since March and are preparing for what could be a tense negotiaton process.
Recent nursing grads, like acute medicine RNs Anjali Sharma and Sara Van Buekenhout, have stepped into a system so desperate for their services it risks burning them out already with poor working conditions.
“They’re not great,” said Sharma. “We’re short-staffed almost everyday. We’re forced to care for six or seven patients sometimes.”
She says the standard in acute care is one to four patients per nurse.
