SASK. PARTY, SHA FAILING OXBOW COMMUNITY, CLOSING HEALTH CENTRE

Rural Healthcare Faces ‘Closure By A Thousand Cuts’ After 18 Years of Failed Leadership

REGINA – The Saskatchewan NDP stood with a municipal official today to call for action to fix the chronic service closures and short staffing that have plagued Oxbow’s health centre and community.

Pamela Bartlett, the Chief Administrative Officer for the R.M of Enniskillen, joined the Opposition at the Legislature today to question why Minister Lori Carr has repeatedly refused the community’s calls for action, including as recently as Nov. 5 in a letter.

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“After 18 years in power, the Sask. Party and their friends running the Saskatchewan Health Authority are driving healthcare workers out of the province and ignoring local communities,” said Keith Jorgenson, Saskatchewan NDP Associate Shadow Minister for Health.

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“This community is pleading with the Sask. Party and the SHA to restore services and bring health care workers back to their communities. Local leaders should not have to drive to Regina to demand action.”

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The manager of the Galloway Health Centre in Oxbow has gone on medical leave, and the SHA has refused to fill the position, opting instead to have another manager at a different facility attempt to cover both.

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The Southeast Healthcare Recruitment and Retention Committee (SHRRC) reports that care has gone downhill, including “increased staff turnover, burnout, and a decline in the completion of essential duties.”

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“The situation has become critical,” said Bartlett in a letter to Minister Carr. “Galloway health centre requires consistent on-site leadership to ensure core functions, such as patient care, staff support, and operational continuity, are not compromised … the joint management model is unsustainable”.

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The Minister also refused in her Nov. 5 letter to expand care at the facility and redesignate it as a hospital, which would allow the community to turn ten transition beds to ten hospital beds and use them to their full capacity.

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“Across the province, this government is slowly cutting back on services and staff in our rural hospitals and health centres,” said Jared Clarke, Shadow Minister for Rural and Remote Health. “It’s closure by a thousand cuts.

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“We need big bold change to get our hospital open again and get our Saskatchewan healthcare out of last place.”

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