Not enough staff at Interior Health!

[Bsuds]

As far as the homecare worker shortage I wonder if it has anything to do with Vaccinations.

You would think they might need to have both jabs to be permitted to interact with the elderly people who need homecare?

Just a thought.

[Omineca]

I'm curious as to how you've come to these conclusions.

How many staff are in middle to upper management positions? How does that compare to similar organizations? And what is an appropriate ratio of mid/upper management to employees?

I'll be honest - I've heard similar claims from others. None have been able to answer the basic questions above. It quickly identifies uninformed speculation vs a credible claim. Which is too bad as I'd love to have an informed debate on this topic.

If I could upvote this, I would.

[Jlabute]

I have heard on a few occasions thst programs for things like care aid, nursing, and a number of others have their graduation rates artificially controlled. I may be remembering incorrectly but if true this would be exacerbating the issue.

Nurses have to pass a standardized provincial exam otherwise they are not allowed to work. A nurse in Kelowna would have to travel to Vancouver to do this. The exam has random questions and is quite difficult. Many nurses do not pass their first attempt and you may be limited to three tries. A Care Aide program is much less intensive and has no provincial exam I am aware of.

Saying that, there are always shortages of Care Aides and LPNs in any care home on any given day because most have a casual position that lasts for years until pt/ft comes available. They may go looking else where and have schedule conflicts, or just slack off and not get paid. Lots of time off for injuries, and no shows. It is a chronic problem. Being hired casual could also mean you get no work for a long time and many care homes end up losing newly hired staff as they move on. Nice thing about casual staff, you don't have to pay benefits.

[Lore]

As far as the homecare worker shortage I wonder if it has anything to do with Vaccinations.

You would think they might need to have both jabs to be permitted to interact with the elderly people who need homecare?

Just a thought.

There is a shortage as the elderly population who need help is growing and there are not enough nursing homes.
IH is constantly trying to hire more care aids but there are not enough trained care aids to hire.
It has nothing to do with vaccinations and no one who works for IH has to get the vaccination anyways.
That is a personal health decision to vax or not.
PPE is used in order to protect clients.

[ReadyToGo]

This is the number to call to make a complaint
1-877-442-2001.
Its encouraged because none of the working members are too happy about it either.
You will not see a compromise in care for calling.

They know it's a problem and they too want it fixed.
And true... often businesses like this do have too many upper staff but as far as caregivers and nurses... not enough.

[Queen K]

As far as the homecare worker shortage I wonder if it has anything to do with Vaccinations.

You would think they might need to have both jabs to be permitted to interact with the elderly people who need homecare?

Just a thought.

Not at the present moment, but if Europe is a trend setter, Italy, France and Greece will not be paying the unvaccinated healthcare workers.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/13/europe/f ... index.html

[ReadyToGo]

I heard earlier in the year that BC or Alberta was offering free careaid courses. Cant remember which but maybe a look into it might get some people employed into the work force.
There is an office called Work BC if I'm right that could answer that.

[nucksRnum1]

My wife is in care with IH. The IH has gone to an online scheduling system. Which is fine. But many aides would pick up extra shifts having an ability to know beforehand where they could go. This new system isnt popular because the system can schedule you anywhere in the zone. And you have to roll the dice.

I think that IH has to be sensible and hire more aides. Otherwise more aides will leave needed contract line positions. And either go casual (controlling their schedule) putting in for where and what they want. There have even been a slew that have quit recently and went to private positions where they know day in and day out where they will be working. Or left the job all together. It is a thankless job and has a toll on their bodies. There are times when there will be "lifts" that require 2 people and they are on their own. This lack of regard for worker health doesn't lift morale. It buries it.

Hopefully IH wakes up and stops trying to do more with less. Then they may have workers that wont feel burned out.

[TylerM4]

Hopefully IH wakes up and stops trying to do more with less. Then they may have workers that wont feel burned out.

Thanks for sharing!

I think IH is forced into this position. Healthcare spending needs to be controlled. The liberal governments have done a great job of doing that in the last decade by cutting annual budget increases to 1/3rd of what they were historically, but it's putting enormous pressure on health authorities to "do more with less". Last statistic I heard - 52% of all tax dollars go to healthcare.

Regardless - I wanted to better understand your wife's challenges with the new scheduling system. Can you confirm I have this right: Your wife works in a part time position with regular scheduled hours/days. But she'd also like to pick up extra shifts on occasion. The new scheduling system doesn't work as well for allowing her to pick and choose which extra shifts she'll take vs refuse? If so - is there an option for hew to take a different PT position with more hours in a week? Or a FT position?

[Jlabute]

I had worked on the original staff scheduling system in the 90's. A joint effort between KGH and BCIT. I moved the technology from BCIT to KGH and developed it further. Eventually handed to Totalcare Technologies after successful implementation, and after that it passed hands once or twice to now be owned by I believe, Logibec.

Originally written in Lisp (I have the floppies), the pattern matching capabilities of Lisp allowed for easier union rule representation and processing, employee preferences, skill tracking, rotations, and so forth in order to help avoid breaking union rules and therefore save money. It has long since ported to C++ I believe. It had an auto-dialer built-in and all sorts of features to make scheduling easier. When staff called in sick, the software would automatically find suitable replacements as to not break union rules and give employees their preferences. I could only assume now this software has a web-interface to allow shift selections.

Sub-projects such as the rotation generator never worked. It is a complex math and social issue. The current scheduling system is cool stuff to say the least.

https://www.logibec.com/en/our-solution ... -analytics


Unfortunately in healthcare, new nurses and care aides mostly begin casual and may or may not get enough shifts. It is rare to get a pt or ft position when hired. Hiring more staff can help initially, but most move on to find other avenues of work since casual pay can't cut it. Lots of money goes to over-time since so many casuals refuse to work or can't on certain days, or are generally unavailable since that is the way they prefer it, or they have injuries, etc. Casuals can hang on for years before a positions comes available.

[nucksRnum1]

Hopefully IH wakes up and stops trying to do more with less. Then they may have workers that wont feel burned out.

Thanks for sharing!

I think IH is forced into this position. Healthcare spending needs to be controlled. The liberal governments have done a great job of doing that in the last decade by cutting annual budget increases to 1/3rd of what they were historically, but it's putting enormous pressure on health authorities to "do more with less". Last statistic I heard - 52% of all tax dollars go to healthcare.

Regardless - I wanted to better understand your wife's challenges with the new scheduling system. Can you confirm I have this right: Your wife works in a part time position with regular scheduled hours/days. But she'd also like to pick up extra shifts on occasion. The new scheduling system doesn't work as well for allowing her to pick and choose which extra shifts she'll take vs refuse? If so - is there an option for hew to take a different PT position with more hours in a week? Or a FT position?

I am going to pretend I didnt see that BC Liberal propaganda and start from there. Yes IH does indeed use shenanigans with .69 of full time schedules. Making much of the staff part time. And yes - many pick up shifts to supplement. The problem was that my wife would work from 7am until 10pm when she did so to still have her days off. But only if she got the shift she wanted and where she wanted. Now with the automated system - you say yes to a shift and can be sent to the ends of the earth. As such aides are not taking shifts. All we hear all day and night is incessant bell sounding notifications on the IH phone because the shifts are ignored. Cest la vie. My wife bid on a full time position - and her seniority got her that position. Because she worked hard and got more hours than many others. So now she doesnt have to worry. But moving to that position may cause a deficit where she was before.

[TylerM4]

I am going to pretend I didnt see that BC Liberal propaganda and start from there. Yes IH does indeed use shenanigans with .69 of full time schedules. Making much of the staff part time. And yes - many pick up shifts to supplement. The problem was that my wife would work from 7am until 10pm when she did so to still have her days off. But only if she got the shift she wanted and where she wanted. Now with the automated system - you say yes to a shift and can be sent to the ends of the earth. As such aides are not taking shifts. All we hear all day and night is incessant bell sounding notifications on the IH phone because the shifts are ignored. Cest la vie. My wife bid on a full time position - and her seniority got her that position. Because she worked hard and got more hours than many others. So now she doesnt have to worry. But moving to that position may cause a deficit where she was before.

Appreciate the extra info

For the record, I'm not a big fan of liberal government. But I do like to give credit where it's due. Their progress in managing healthcare spending is something nobody can argue with. It's right there in the numbers. Was it a good move, has the quality of care been impacted, should they be applauded for it, etc... I can't say. My apologies if it came across as "the liberal government is great" as that wasn't my intent. I was only trying to show that HA's have been getting a lot of pressure to do more with less.

Otherwise, sounds like I had interpreted it correctly. I don't think IHA has purposely committed "shenanigans" with the PT positions. As they're union positions that qualify for full benefits, it's not in their best interest to create PT over FT positions. In fact - quite the opposite. It would save IH money to have fewer PT positions.

[gertlush]

Agree with the toll on the body comment, i had no idea about the lifts etc until i knew someone who worked in the field. Its physical work and yeah... pretty thankless. Easier to go work in an office somewhere for similar pay.

[nepal]

IH has enough staff, too much in fact, the only problem is most of this staff is middle to upper management on the administrative side. IH has got to be one of the most over-bloated and top-heavy organizations out there. Sometimes I think they have so much middle to upper management no one really knows who is responsible for what and the buck keeps being passed around in a never-ending mess of bureaucracy.

It’s hard to find good help these days, especially administrative.
https://www.publicsectorcompensation.go ... D-2020.pdf
.
They are very open about staffing, which is good. All readily available on web.
https://www.interiorhealth.ca/AboutUs/A ... 202020.pdf

[Queen K]

Appreciate the extra info

For the record, I'm not a big fan of liberal government. But I do like to give credit where it's due. Their progress in managing healthcare spending is something nobody can argue with. It's right there in the numbers. Was it a good move, has the quality of care been impacted, should they be applauded for it, etc... I can't say. My apologies if it came across as "the liberal government is great" as that wasn't my intent. I was only trying to show that HA's have been getting a lot of pressure to do more with less.

Otherwise, sounds like I had interpreted it correctly. I don't think IHA has purposely committed "shenanigans" with the PT positions. As they're union positions that qualify for full benefits, it's not in their best interest to create PT over FT positions. In fact - quite the opposite. It would save IH money to have fewer PT positions.

I tried to keep out of this publically but here I am. LOL.

1. No one will call the new system "progress" under any circumstances.

2. But they did create part time positions. They really really did. Lots of them.