HMR emergency: a management culture in the east of Montreal to change according to the union

The emergency room of the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital would look like this.

A strike threat by nearly 100 nurses working in the Maisonneuve-Rosemont emergency room (HMR) further complicates the already unbearable daily life of this hospital.

In a petition, revealed by Radio-Canada and of which Metro obtained a copy, 92 of the 113 workers in the emergency unit are demanding the resignation of the head of the unit. Exacerbated by at least 80 Compulsory Overtime (TSO) in four days, last weekend, the nurses also criticize her for “having nothing in place since her arrival to try to retain her staff.”< /p>

“The situation is such that as soon as you get there, you only have one thing in mind: to leave the emergency room. It’s too difficult,” testifies Joséphine (fictitious name for fear of reprisals), a nurse of Haitian origin who worked there only for four days. “Afterwards, I left running”, she said in an interview with the newspaper.

Fedeline (another fictitious name) considers that “it is aggressive to the limit” the requests for TSO made by the responsible.

They will ask you many times when you said no. They'll tell you you're next on the list, etc.

Fedeline, nurse who works part-time at the Rosemont emergency room.

She refuses to work full time precisely because of the number of OSIs that are required of those who do. “The TSO is violent,” says the president of the Union of Care Professionals of the East-of-the-Island of Montreal, Denis Cloutier.

The president of the Union of healthcare professionals; East of the Island of Montreal, Denis Cloutier

Dubé does “a bit of politics”

“It's every day that we impose this on them and it's to tell them that they won't be able to pick up their children from daycare, that they're going to miss a family dinner,” denounces the trade unionist in an interview. with Metro.

Asked this week about the case of HMR, the Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, said he found that this hospital had the most “difficulty implementing measures” within the framework of the use of the TSO. He even wondered: why was it like this in Rosemont when some thirty other health establishments in Quebec had managed to do it?

There is a management culture in the east of Montreal that needs to be changed, but beyond that, Minister Dubé, I find that he is a bit political.

Denis Cloutier, president of the Syndicat de l'est,

“Shortage is hitting everywhere, adds Mr. Cloutier, I would really like to have the figures for the other hospitals, I have the figures for the east, and we have lost a lot of employees because of the TSO, there are very few people left. reproach in the petition

“The entire team of nurses and auxiliary nurses in the hospital emergency room demand the immediate resignation of our unit head […] otherwise we undertake to submit our resignation.”

“We blame him for not having put anything in place since his arrival to try to retain his staff. His lack of support, listening and empathy towards the team contributes to generating a toxic atmosphere and inhuman working conditions.”

“Since his appointment to this position last July, there has been a dramatic deterioration in our working conditions. The number of OSIs is constantly growing and this encourages the members of our team to leave, thus creating more than deplorable working conditions.”

The CIUSS did not want to react to this departure of the nurses . The occupancy rate for stretchers in the HMR emergency department was close to 141% over the past week. This hospital is one of the oldest in the province. In August 2021, the Quebec government announced the authorization of the hospital modernization project. The project consists of the reconstruction of several current sectors of the hospital and its expansion, and this, on the same site.

It would considerably increase the reception capacity of the hospital infrastructure , which will increase from 544 to 720 beds. This phase represents an investment of 2.5 billion dollars but could last between 11 and 13 years.