Not enough nurses - Dialysis patient says wait times too long

[okarol]

Not enough nurses
Dialysis patient says wait times too long
DENISE PIKE
The Compass
22/07/08

Three times a week for the past three years Ira Dale has been going to Carbonear General Hospital for kidney dialysis.
"I'm there every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for a good five and a half hours because that's how long it takes," he says. "The year before the unit opened in Carbonear, I had to go to St. John's to have it done."
Dale's kidney failure stems from diabetes. The condition has also taken 90 per cent of his eyesight.
"On top of all that a few years ago I had surgery for five by-passes," he adds. "My life is pretty limited these days. The dialysis machine is my life line."
Friday July 18, Dale, age 58, woke bright and early to go to Carbonear for his 7 a.m. dialysis appointment. Around 6 a.m he got a call from the hospital.
"I was told not to even think about coming in at my usual time because there weren't enough nurses available to work the unit," he says.
When The Compass spoke to Dale at 9:45 a.m, he still hadn't heard back from the hospital.
The Coley's Point man says it isn't the first time his dialysis has been delayed with little or no explanation from the hospital.
"Sometimes I've left the house, en route to the hospital when they have called to cancel. Other times I have been there waiting for over an hour or more to be hooked up because there aren't enough nurses available," he says. "A few times I've even been told to go to St. John's for dialysis because there isn't enough staff at the unit in Carbonear. But I don't want to go to town and I don't see why any of us should have to go. After all, that's why we got this dialysis unit here in the area in the first place, so we wouldn't have to do that. It's just ridiculous."
Dale says the delays affect the other dialysis patients in the unit as well. "There's around five or six of us scheduled in the unit at a time so they are in the same boat that I am," he says.

http://www.cbncompass.ca/index.cfm?sid=155248&sc=326

[flip]

Hard to believe. Our nurse to patient rato is 4:1 plus one or two floaters for lunches, breaks, etc.

[Chris]

I could see my local hospital doing this. They just started taking in patients off the street compared to doing only in patient services. The diaysis workers switch between hospitals, sometimes just out of the whim call in to say they are not coming in. I don't know how many people they now have working there now that they have a dialysis center though compared to just inpatient care. However, we have 2 dialysis units close by and another in the hospital on the east side of town. Still transportation is a factor.