During a press conference on Monday led by HSAA (The Health Sciences Association of Alberta) President, Mike Parker called on the provincial government to step up.
HSAA, which is a trade union representing over 27,000 paramedical technical, professional and general support employees in the public and private healthcare sectors of Alberta, presented a three-point strategy in which there was a call to protect the physical and mental well-being of its members, as well as developing a plan to recruit new blood into the profession.
“Last week started with 276 unfilled paramedic shifts across this province,” Parker said. “Despite the incredibly difficult times that we are in, healthcare professionals in this province continue to show up. It’s what we do. It’s who we are. But we need to be supported by this government and our employer.”
In a written statement to Discover Airdrie, James Wood the Director, Media Relations & Issues Management for AHS stated that, “To ensure shifts are filled, AHS EMS redeploys supervisors to frontline duty and is also offering overtime to staff who are willing to fill shifts. At times, we may temporarily reposition units from other communities or defer non-urgent transfers to address shift gaps, and may also use a single paramedic response units as needed. EMS has also brought on additional staff and ambulances and filled 100 paramedic positions across the province as well as working closely with hospital teams to ensure timely flow through our emergency departments.”
In Airdrie alone, on January 16th, three Airdrie ambulances were not present in Airdrie for a total of seven consecutive hours, as they were responding to events in other jurisdictions.
AHS said that they have increased the number of paramedics by nine per cent over the last two years, from 2,659 in 2019 to 2,891 in 2021 to date. However, this is only AHS paramedics, which does not include other staff and also does not include contracted operators.
When asked what the position of the HSAA is on first responders and other healthcare professionals speaking out about the staffing and wait times crisis, Parker said that the AHS has predatory practices that aim to keep their employees silent.
“It is dangerous times when we speak the truth. They know the truth, the employer does, the government does and they are using a heavy hand to ensure that they don’t speak out as frontline paramedics,” he said. “Our members are reaching out to us; We’re able to vet that information confirm it is actual, scrub the information so that they cannot be identified and send it out through social media. I have heard that there are challenges on the front lines because of this and encourage any members to speak out to please flow through us so we can protect them from this predatory employer.”
Wood wrote that “All AHS employees are expected to adhere to our Code of Conduct, which covers social media activity, and includes treating all people with respect, compassion, dignity and fairness.” However, Wood did not specify what information can be disseminated by first responders to the public and what cannot.
According to HSAA, over 40 per cent of their members indicated that they are considering reducing hours or leaving health care entirely.
“Our lack of capacity is currently curtailed by the inability to fill vacant positions. Most weeks we have over 200 paramedic shifts vacant because there is no staff available.”
Parker also addressed what he sees as empty promises from the government regarding N-95 masks.
“Don’t just promise workers they will get appropriate PPE (Personal Protective Equipment). Get it to them now,” he said. “Anyone working in the public should have access to an N-95 mask immediately. We need to ensure that our members stay healthy and that they are not taking on the additional strain of worrying about bringing COVID back to their families.”
Discover Airdrie did reach out to AHS to ask about the procurement of N-95 masks for healthcare workers. Wood in his written statement wrote, “All clinical and non-clinical health care workers who are within two metres of a patient with suspected, presumed, or confirmed COVID-19, will wear a fit-tested N95 respirator, gown, gloves, and eye protection. EMS has an adequate supply of N-95 masks, and EMS staff are using these. Staff have extensive training about when it is appropriate to wear N95 masks. If any worker has an issue with mask fittings, they are able to reach out to a supervisor or request additional training.”
“What we are saying is the N-95 fitted respirator is the required piece of PPE for all healthcare workers. Information from the front lines is being communicated clearly to our office that those masks are not available,” Parker said. “This government knows it and they need to step up and do the right thing and protect our front lines of health care.”
Parker also said that in the past few weeks a troubling trend of forced over-time has begun to emerge as staffing shortages continue.
“This is not just people signing up for extra shifts. It’s a paramedic being dispatched for a long response in the final minutes of their shift when they desperately need to get home to their families and on time. It’ a lab worker being denied any breaks over the course of an entire shift despite their own medical needs. Our members will work those extra shifts, but they need assurances that they will be treated with compassion.”
AHS stated that, “All in-scope Paramedic staff requested and are approved for 75 per cent of their annual vacation allotment at the start of the year via the Annual Vacation Selection process. This time is awarded in order of seniority. This is a standard process and is not new. It ensures a fair and transparent allocation of time. EMS staff, like all staff at AHS, have sick leave provisions. It is categorically untrue to say staff are being punished for calling in sick.”
According to HSSA, between Monday, January 10, 2022 – Sunday, January 16, 2022, there were:
- At least 148 Red Alerts in at least 35 communities.
- At least 84 ambulances dropped in 42 communities due to no paramedics available to crew them.
- At Least 13 ambulances downgrade from ALS to BLAS due to no Advance Care Paramedic available to crew.
- At Least 250 long response/out of jurisdiction incidents including 14 initial response times exceeded one hour.
