Nurses are expected to gather in their numbers at the Eric Williams Medical Sciences Complex, Mt Hope, today to protest extended visiting hours at public health facilities and other directives given by Health Minister Dr Fuad Khan.
But Khan said yesterday the changes would take effect from today and systems would be in place to monitor how the extension of visiting hours at public health facilities worked after they went into effect.
Khan was responding to objections raised by nurses over the extension of visiting hours from 7 am to 9.30 am and 3 pm to 5.30 pm (Monday to Friday) and from 3 pm to 6.30 pm on weekends and public holidays.
T&T Registered Nurses Association president Gwendolyn Loobie-Snaggs claimed Khan didn’t consult with them and the measure would be impractical and affect nurses’ work at those times. The association also had a problem with Khan’s decision to allow relatives to assist with cleaning patients and to allow fathers into the delivery rooms.
But Khan, saying the decision would take effect today, added, “We have nothing to hide.”
He said relatives could assist in the cleaning of their loved ones as this would not hamper nurses’ duties. “So I don’t understand the issue, I can’t see why someone would object to having assistance on the wards,” he said.
Khan confirmed that he had received many complaints, including via the ministry’s Web site, about patients not being cleaned up, of relatives visiting a ward and having to suffer because of seeing elderly or severely ill patients not being cleaned even though medical personnel were present and relatives asked them to assist, and also of patients “being bawled at.” He said the regional health authorities would monitor the situation to see how things worked with the extension.
But yesterday, Loobie-Snaggs said today’s implementation date was unrealistic and reiterated that there was no discussion between the minister and the various stakeholders.
“While the association applauds the minister for some of the initiatives which would enhance the safety and comfort of staff, as well as patients, there are measures which cannot be supported in its present form,” Loobie-Snaggs maintained.
Meanwhile, speaking at yesterday’s post-cabinet media conference, Khan clarified recent reported remarks that the health sector was a hospitality sector and no one should be abused. He said his remarks were that even if a health worker was angry, abuse of patients should not happen and the worker should not be there if he or she felt that way.
“I didn’t say who didn’t like it should leave,” he added of an Express headline on his statements.
He said staying on the job while angry and treating patients in an abusive manner would not help the medical personnel get a salary increase. He said such personnel had to use their bargaining power on any salary issue and should be cordial to the patients. He said there were steps to take if a patient was abusive, but there was no recourse if staff members were abusive to patients.
On a recent issue at the Northwest RHA where nurses took protest action after a nurse was attacked by a patient, Khan said he wondered if the nurses would still have taken protest action if they had known the entire story and the report he’d received from the patient. He said he was not saying the patient or nurses were right or wrong and agreed there was need for security at all levels, but he raised questions about how security would respond to such situations if everything was factored in.
He said 98 per cent of patients would not react to a lack of cordial treatment since they were afraid of victimisation, but there had been letters and comments on talk shows on the issue.
NGO subvention
Khan also said Government was giving a $240,000 subvention to the Just Because Foundation.
The foundation was started by Noel and Shivonne Joseph to help families with young children diagnosed with cancer, after the Josephs’ three-year-old son died of a rare lung cancer.
Khan said the family had realised that other families in similar circumstances needed assistance and they had facilitated accommodation at Diego Martin for four families, as well as transport, food, counselling, literature and bereavement support for such families.