Blame government for staff shortages; ‘If one link in the chain is not working, then the entire hospital doesn’t function,’ MD says By CHARLIE FIDELMAN, The Gazette A top Health Department official yesterday rejected suggestions that a string of emergency room deaths and surgery delays were caused by a lack of government investment in nurses, saying no political party has done more for Quebec’s nurses than the governing Liberals. “I’m not saying there’s not more to do, that’s coming gradually,” said Karin Rivard, press attaché to provincial...

By Lyndsay Moss MEDICAL employers across Scotland are being warned to check that any doctors they employ are fit for the job and can speak good enough English. The General Medical Council (GMC) is writing to NHS managers and private health companies to highlight gaps in what the regulator is able to check with medics wanting to work in the UK. This includes laws which mean doctors who qualified in European Union countries do not have to complete language or skills tests before being allowed to join the medical register. Read More…

Posted By FRANK DOBROVNIK, The Sault Star When it came to physician recruitment, Northern Ontario long complained about having to compete with the south for smaller and smaller pieces of the pie. Now, the pie’s all ours. Sault Ste. Marie MPP David Orazietti announced Friday the most sweeping changes to the Underserviced Area Program since it was created in 1969, beginning with its new name: the Health Force Ontario Northern and Rural Recruitment Program (N3R) and the HFO Postgraduate Return of Service Program. Read More…

By Tammie Smith Aging population creates the need for care workers Angela Pitchford and other students in a nurse aide class in South Richmond are learning that there is a correct way to put a support stocking on a fragile patient, to help a patient move to a chair and to help a patient eat. Nurse aides do a lot of the basic physical duties in patient care settings –work calling for very intimate interaction with patients and tasks many view as unglamorous and messy. Read More…

by Josh Heck Health care-related jobs top a Kansas list as the industry with the most vacancies and the highest demand for workers. The Kansas Department of Labor’s 2009 job vacancy survey shows the second-quarter demand for positions in health care remained steady, while demand for workers overall was down. Read More…

By CARLA K. JOHNSON CHICAGO — Doctors have steadily cut their work hours over the past decade, a new study finds, something that experts say may only worsen the health care situation. It’s not that doctors are terrible slackers. Average hours dropped from about 55 to 51 hours per week from 1996 to 2008, according to the analysis, appearing in Wednesday’s Journal of the American Medical Association. That’s the equivalent of losing 36,000 doctors in a decade, according to the researchers. Read More…

Patient care is suffering as European rules restricting working hours means there is a shortage of doctors, the British Medical Association has warned. By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor Six months after the European Working Time Directive was applied to junior doctors, bringing their maximum weekly hours down from 56 to 48, there are major problems, a survey has found. The British Medical Association surveyed junior doctors and found that four in ten are working on teams that do not have enough people. Read More…

By ANDREW VILLEGAS TYRRELL COUNTY, N.C. — There are no doctors in rural Tyrrell County, N.C. There’s only Irene Cavall, a licensed nurse practitioner and the sole source of primary care for 4,000 residents spread out over 600 square miles. It’s been that way since the county’s lone doctor moved away two and a half years ago. Cavall sees as many as 40 patients a day at the Columbia Medical Center. It’s about 40 miles west of the Outer Banks; an ambulance ride to the nearest hospital takes 25 minutes. Read More…

Nurses, doctors and other health professionals are working together with higher education institutions, state health and labor agencies and others to collectively address the long-standing problem of too-few health care providers available to care for Coloradans, according to a news release from The Colorado Trust. With more than 30 members, the Colorado Health Professions Workforce Policy Collaborative is developing policy solutions to close the health professions gap. To strengthen and sustain this grassroots effort, The Colorado Trust has awarded a $205,000 grant to the Colorado Rural Health...

Lieutenant governor makes stop in Tyler to tour health center By JIMMY ISAAC TYLER — Shortages of nurses and doctors in Texas must be corrected for a state population expected to double by 2035, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst said Tuesday. Dewhurst toured biomedical research labs at the University of Texas Health Science Center during his first official visit to the campus. The center has raised about $70 million for medical research in the past five years, he said. Today, Texas is 22,000 nurses short of ideal, Dewhurst said. If nothing is done, that shortage will grow to 71,000 nurses over the next...