The province’s nursing shortage is causing a snowball effect, making the problem even worse.
Janet Hazelton, President of the Nova Scotia Nurses Union, said 1086 registered nurse, 235 licensed practical nurse, and 12 nurse practitioner positions are vacant.
Hazelton said those staff shortages are causing semi-retired nurses, still in the casual nursing pool, to stop picking up shifts.
“Signing up for a 12-hour shift and having to work 16 hours,” she said. “They’re saying ‘enough. I can’t do that.’”
Hazelton said it’s also causing younger nurses to avoid taking full time positions.
She said they can get all the work they need by taking casual shifts above their part time hours, and doing that allows them to have a work/life balance.
Hazelton said the province needs to act now to keep the problem from getting worse.
“We’re not educating enough, I mean, it’s just we’re not,” she said. “We have to increase the seats at all the universities.”
She said, on top of that, we need to incentivize students to stay and work after they graduate, giving them scholarships for return-of-service. If they commit to just a couple years working here, they’re much more likely to settle down and stay.
She said this used to be a problem unique to rural areas, but now even Halifax is affected.
