Defend Public Healthcare

The Central East Community Care Access Centre (covering Durham, Northumberland, Peterborough, Haliburton, and Scarborough) reports a drastic decline in the amount of services it provided in its most recent annual report . There was 199,000 fewer "units" of personal support provided than in the previous year. The personal support budget was cut almost $4 million.  Nursing was harder hit. Nursing visits were reduced by 250,000 "units" and  2,000 fewer clients were served.  The visiting nurse budget was cut by over $8 million -- a 19% cut. Physiotherapy service units were cut 28%. Overall, Central East CCAC expenditures were cut almost $12 million, while its revenue actually increased over $7 million. In 2009-10 there was a significant deficit, so these cuts may have been made to make up for CCAC's debt. With no guarantee of home care, the care you receive is driven by budget rather than need.

Most citizens of Peterborough and the surrounding area have been concerned for some time that huge staffing cuts at the hospital will erode patient care. Peterborough Health Coalition (PHC) has now opened a secure mailbox in the lobby of City Hall to collect confidential, accurate examples of declining care.  The Coalition plans to build a case for improvement. This mail box service was apporved by City Council last August. The collection of information will be the sole responsibility of PHC, and not of the City, and will be kept confidential until the authors specifically agree to release the examples for use by PHC on their behalf. The Coalition hopes that the documentation of declining care will help them build their case for adequate staffing at the local hospital. The  media will be kept informed. Roy Brady, Chairperson, Peterborough Health Coalition can be contacted at 705-745-2446.  A editorial dealing with this initiative by the Peterborough examiner is here .  Kudos to t

A staff member at Peterborough Regional Health Centre found a fingernail in her soup at the hospital's cafeteria. The cafeteria has been taken over by the giant transnational corporation, Compass.  They claim the fingernail came in a package from a supplier (of course) . Compass is also trying to take over food services at Kingston General Hospital, likely shipping in food from the same facility as in Peterborough. Soup anyone? dallan@cupe.ca

Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC) has announced that it will spend $8.2 million on severance and early retirement packages. The hospital is cutting over 280 jobs as part of the provincial government's hospital funding squeeze. With another $600,000 spent on retraining, the hospital's 2010-11 deficit will double to $17.8 million. PRHC president and CEO Ken Tremblay notes that the provincial government has sometimes given funding to help with one-time costs such as early retirement and severance packages when a hospital is cutting its deficit. "We haven't turned it into an ask, but we've certainly declared that the pressures that we face are significant...We're hopeful but ... the fiscal recovery plan contemplates that we self-finance this restructuring and we'll see how this progresses with each successive meeting with the LHIN." To cut costs, the hospital is driving down the average length of stay at the hospital. Length of stay in the

Lots of fun yesterday at the OCHU/CUPE rally in defense of the Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC), with a major focus on local Liberal MPP Jeff Leal. The rally called on him to start to fight for the local hospital, rather than the cuts. The so-called "Hospital Improvement Plan"   cuts 1 2 medical beds, along with 8 surgical beds, 4 critical care beds, and 4 beds for women and children.  The plan also envisages closing 32 beds at Christmas and March break, and closing 16 beds during 4 summer weeks.  Other cuts include: driving down the length of stay, reduced diagnostic testing, reduced CT scan staffing (despite already having CT wait times well over the provincial target), reductions in the neuro and breathing clinic, reductions in hospital cleaning staff, and reductions in dietary staff. As well, in January, 24 medical beds were reduced to "sub-acute" beds.  Eight other sub-acute beds are being created. But as these sub-acute beds are the targets of c

Remember Peterborough Regional Health Centre?  They were effectively ordered by the provincial government to cut costs.  The result -- 283 hospital jobs (182.3 full time equivalent positions) are being cut, right this minute. Health Minister Deb Matthews has claimed that hospital cuts aren't so bad because there is so much more community care. But the Community Care Access Centre (CCAC) that oversees home care services in Peterborough is in a similar predicament as the hospital.  The CCAC is now reported to have fallen $14 million into deficit over the last two years -- and so it too is cutting costs, right this minute. (Of course, they say they are cutting costs without cutting home care programs and services.  Just like the McGuinty government says it is doing in hospitals.  With probably the same degree of accuracy.) The Mike Harris government professed that hospital cuts would be made up by more care in the community.  I don't think it is any more true now than i

Now here's a heck of a good question, headlining this Leftwords 'letter of the day'... Where is MPP when hospital needs defending? The Peterborough Examiner, Thu Jul 29 2010, Page: A4 Dear Editor, Two articles in the July 27 edition of The Peterborough Examiner struck me as ironic: the front page article "Layoff notices for 85 RNs" and on Page 3 an article "Leal defends himself." Jeff Leal attended the July 5 city council meeting where the Peterborough Regional Health Centre's financial recovery plan was discussed and on July 15 met with members of the Local Health Integration Network. He supported the same plan that starts by laying off 85 hard-working health care professionals. Ironic that Mr. Leal, who campaigned on his local ties to the community, would support such a devastating plan for PRHC and the services the hospital provides. It appears he has no interest in defending the Peterborough hospital. PETE WRIGHT Kawartha Heig

CUPE Local 1943 president Karen Ward has broken the news that Peterborough Regional Health Centre is planning to lay off 42 CUPE members.  CUPE's employment security language may help divert some of this into early retirements and voluntary exits. The hospital has already eliminated another 31 CUPE positions, through attrition and a hiring freeze. The hospital is meeting with its four union locals to deal with the layoffs. Earlier, the Ontario Nurses Association announced that 85 RNs will be given layoff notices with another 44 RN positions already eliminated. The two OPSEU locals at the hospital have already seen the loss of positions -- indeed, over 50 hospital paramedical and office positions remain vacant. A total of 182.3 full time equivalent positions (283 actual jobs ) are supposed to be eliminated across the hospital, making this the biggest hospital cuts since the Rouge Valley Health Centre. The community has held rallies and planted lawn signs demanding local Liberal

The so-called 'hospital improvement plan' (HIP) is out for Peterborough Regional Health Centre. Or at least the slide show version of it.  Instead of adopting the proposals in the Peer Review, the HIP came up with a bunch of new plans. That's hardly surprising -- the point is not "hospital improvement", the point is to cut, cut, and cut again.  The HIP proposes $23.3M in cuts and $3.7M in increased revenues (including a $2.6M increase in funding from the government). This compares with $25.7M in cuts and $1 million in increased local revenues proposed in the Peer Review. The number of beds to be cut is now 'only' 20, with perhaps some more bed cuts to come later. Despite the decrease in dollar cuts proposed in the HIP, the number of full time equivalent positions (FTEs) to be eliminated has increased.  Instead of cutting 151.5 FTEs (as proposed by the Peer Review) they are now proposing to cut 171.9 FTEs – an increase 13.5%, or 20.4FTEs. That's q