This transcript has been edited lightly for clarification. For additional details, please refer to the posted video and presentation or call us at 204.451.0164 for assistance.
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Hey! Joy!
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Peter Truijen: You’re calling, you’re talking.
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mellis: Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us just for a quick update.
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mellis: I know, all of you have significant responsibilities, and you’ve got the AMM coming up.
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mellis: So this is just to stay connected.
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mellis: And today is April the eighth. And apparently there’s an eclipse coming. So
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mellis: our agenda today. We’re just going to do a quick update on health system status in Interlake-Eastern RHA.
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mellis: And our first guest today is going to be from the Interlake Eastern Health Foundation.
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mellis: And then we’re going to talk about just care providers and our status for delivery
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mellis: and some recruitment of physicians, etc. And then there’s a couple of major capital projects that are almost at the end stage
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mellis: that you might have questions about.
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mellis: And of course, immigration is
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mellis: a significant happening in Canada
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mellis: and also in Manitoba.
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mellis: And that’s kind of tethered and linked to recruitment and retention. And there’s questions.
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mellis: And just to make sure that we’re staying in communication, so that when you have frustrations with the system or worries, you know how to get a hold of us, and we’re not strangers. So it’s really great that you can make it today. Thank you for doing that. We appreciate it.
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mellis: This is going to be taped and recorded.
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mellis: So when we talk about health system status and how we’re doing.
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mellis: many of us in our younger years certainly thought we were independent, and we might not have needed other people.
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mellis: But I know for myself, just bombing down the highway. I was always grateful of whoever made the tires and the technology for the vehicles that we drive right now, because I’d never be able to build one myself.
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mellis: And likewise when you grow across a big bridge.
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mellis: the engineers that made that happen
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mellis: for us in the health system. Our partners are critical. They are people who are bringing a pipeline of support for us. And the partner we’ve mentioned up here right now is Red River Community College.
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mellis: So we are doing some work with them, trying to promote our region.
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mellis: because we would really like to hire some of the graduating health professionals that are coming out of a university and colleges at the moment so moving on to the next slide would like to introduce you to Averill Stephenson. She’s the executive director for the Interlake Eastern Health Foundation. Averill, Please come on and introduce yourself in a more fulsome way.
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mellis: and let people know where we’re at with the foundation at the moment, please and thank you.
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Averill Stephenson: Thank you, Marion, and thank you, everybody. I wanted to start by extending a big thank you to all of you for your warm welcome support and sharing of ideas since I joined the foundation last May. I look forward to continuing our conversations and connecting in person, if we haven’t already
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Averill Stephenson: the Interlake Eastern Health Foundation has been busy. We have a new strategic plan, a new logo. We launched our first holiday campaign over the holiday season this year. But one thing that remains steadfast is our commitment to working with communities to improve health and healthcare, as Marion indicated. And as you’ll hear about today. We know there are challenges, and it takes creativity, commitment and community to address and fill these gaps.
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Averill Stephenson: We also know the way forward is working together. We want to increase opportunities, to welcome healthcare staff to our communities and to provide them with opportunities to learn, grow, and live.
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Averill Stephenson: I look forward to the chance to meet with you and members of your community to share ideas and develop solutions to the challenges that we are currently facing one of the goals of the foundation is always to increase awareness about who we are and what we do. And I look to all of you for your help. If there’s an event coming up in your community that you think we should attend. Please let me know my contact. Information is on the screen, and I encourage you to reach out anytime. Thank you so much.
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mellis: You did that so graciously, Averill, you never said, we’re going out, cap in hand, begging. That was.
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mellis: okay. Okay. Yeah, okay, thank you, Averill. And there’s questions so like getting through this so that you can have questions is all of you because of your leadership. Roles are well aware of the budget. But we have the link there, and of course these today’s session will be shared.
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mellis: and some of you, I’m sure, have already read it from the cover to the end. And some of us are delving into areas that are more specific to our interest. But it is I think it’s important,
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mellis: as you well know, to be aware of the realities of
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mellis: the coffers and the challenges for leadership and governments anywhere in Canada at the moment.
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mellis: So a little bit of level setting in the next slide. You’re all aware of this, possibly.
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mellis: but we were at a Town Hall meeting in Arborg recently, and Mayor Dueck opened the meeting, did it by saying, we’re not going to blame government, and we’re not going to blame the RHA! That was lovely cause, he said. We all knew that the baby boomer we’re going to be aging out.
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mellis: and we just it has caught us a little bit off guard.
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mellis: and many of us through the years have just looked at articles, and I apologize if you’ve heard this before. But some people would say the baby boomers are educated. They go to the gym. We didn’t have gyms when our grandparents were alive. It’s not going to be a burden on the health system.
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mellis: but that’s not the case. So on the left hand side of the screen you will see the population pyramid in Manitoba for 2023
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mellis: so, and then it says to 2035 on the left hand side of that pyramid, you know. Kind of that’s almost looks like a clay oven. It goes straight up, and then narrows at the top with a little bit of a bulge
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mellis: On the left is males on the right as females.
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mellis: and then on the outside you see what looks like a rope.
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mellis: That rope is shown what the population pyramid in 2020 and 2035 is going to be 11 years from now
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mellis: and then on the right hand side you will see into Lake Eastern, so our population, pyramid, as you will see here.
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mellis: is heavy at the top. So you see that, like once we reach, say, 55 54, it says here.
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mellis: and our widest bulge right now, because, remember, the solid part is right now. Our widest bulge is 60 to 64 year olds
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mellis: up to 74 year olds. And then, when you see the rope
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mellis: on the outside are that shadow, it just shows that that age group is going to go up in the next 11 years
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mellis: we had recently, and I don’t have a document with it. It was a meeting that the CEOs and the CFOs were called to.
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mellis: and it said, an 80 year old costs 6 times more in healthcare than a 40 year old, and you’re all probably thinking. Well, of course, that makes sense, it does.
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mellis: But also, how are we going to address that? And how are we going to be going to use Avro’s words creative solution focused and astute and smart in how we maintain a standard of care.
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mellis: and also are sensible about the realities of money.
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mellis: because resources
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mellis: are limited, whether it’s whatever resources, whether it’s money or human resources. There’s always so much capacity in society, and we have to live with that reality and still do right? So that’s just shown you that we’re not exaggerating and making things up. This is just facts about
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mellis: the age and population, and what they call us silver tsunamis. So, moving on to the next slide
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mellis: again, you’ve got into Lake Eastern here, and Laura Lou pulled this off for me, because this is the percentage of the total healthcare expenditure. This is expenditure on individuals 8, 65, and over in Canada. So this is a 20 year span. You could say, it’s from 2019 versus 2040. So when you look at the 2 pies, you can see in 2019
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mellis: 45% point 7, it looks like just half of the pie was used for healthcare expenditure on individuals. And then, when you look at 2040, which is like 16 years from now it’ll be 71.4%.
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mellis: So that is just showing cost associated with our agent population. Go. Those are just facts. And again.
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mellis: we’re not crying, Wolf. We’re just saying these are realities. Now there could be another pandemic. I know some of you maybe can’t stand the thought of that.
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mellis: But we know that in the new millennium we were told we’d see more pandemics. And some of us thought, Yeah, we’ll believe it when we see it, and was it 2003 we had SARS?
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mellis: And then in 2009, we had H1N1. And then in 2020, because from starting in the fall of 2019 and one we had the second Corona virus, really.
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mellis: But there was one in, I think it was around 2011 can’t remember, but it was MERS, the Middle Eastern Coronavirus that and it wasn’t just contagious, but it didn’t quite burst into pandemic. But you are aware that
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mellis: a lot of microorganisms are pathogens that cause us
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mellis: concern and spill over into humans are from we could say the animal or world anything that is nonhuman. And that way. And as we encroach, and as our population and the world grows. There’s more risk for that. This is again not gloom and doom. It’s just that if there were one that did damage to some of us my age group. That would be only thing that might change this projection. Anyway, we’re not hoping for that.
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mellis: What we have to do, and it’s not hope is we have to find a way to be smart with how we care for people and each other. So you’re going to ask in our next slide like, where are we going to focus our efforts?
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mellis: For years we’ve talked about. It’s very important of a primary care provider
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mellis: and to detect illness early and it to intervene
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mellis: early. So we’re not dealing with things when they’re in
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mellis: A much more difficult stage to deal with them. Our grandparents used to say that
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mellis: A stitch and time saves 9. And we that’s really what primary care is about. It’s about having that stitch and time.
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mellis: So that’s where we have to focus. And to that end, even though we all wish for more physicians. And we know work has been doing provincially and has started in the last year or so
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mellis: to increase physician capacity. In the meantime, we’re very, very grateful for the nurse practitioners we have that are joining our primary care teams and help them with chronic disease management. And then our other focus is we have to support and strengthen our workforce whichever way we do that, and
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mellis: we just will have to look at creative ways of doing that to strengthen it. So we’re not as fragile as we’re feeling. We are at the moment.
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mellis: So when you look at the status of service delivery and care providers in our next slide just want to give a quick update. So everybody is aware of what’s been happening.
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mellis: So in White mouth Dr. Davidson had left, and Dr. Abbas Shiva and Dr. Tanner are going to be covering Monday to Fridays from April until August, and then Dr. Dele Atoyebi is going to take over in September. So and the Reeve
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mellis: and the CEO of Whitemouth are aware of this.
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mellis: Both is your Dr. Penner is finalized in the process of recruiting a physician and working with the physicians there, for the both is your clinic, because that’s a fee for service, Clinic
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mellis: Pinawa – We have filled that Pinawa position with was summer locums. They’re going to cover the clinic and the emergency department in Pinawa . This summer
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mellis: Oak Bank has recruited Dr. Atainyang for Oakbank to cover 2 days a week at the Kin Place Clinic.
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mellis: and then we get really busy, as you all know, more than I do. When a pig beach used to be 3 days a week we’ve increased it over. About a year ago we increased it to 5 days a week, and then we’re going to have a walk in clinic on the weekend.
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mellis: What physicians and a nurse practitioner are true this summer season.
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mellis: Grand Marais. We’re planning on running a summer weekend walking clinic at grandma, and there are physicians recruited for that. So stay posted as to who they will be.
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mellis: In Gimli, we fill 2 months of the 6 months leave vacancy in Gimli, and we’re working on filling the remaining months. So you’re aware of that Victoria Beach leaders
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mellis: have done this all on their own for the last number of years, and they have recruited a physician for physician services and a clinic over the summer months.
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mellis: and then that again, is July and August
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mellis: Gypsumville. We need to resume primary care services there in Gypsumville, and with the recruitment
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mellis: And we’re really grateful because the 2 nurse practitioners from Highway 6 are Brandy from Eriksdale.
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mellis: and is going to be going out into Lake Manitoba as well as the Eriksdale clinic, and Marco again. Brandy has been a nurse for years in Eriksdale, and Marco has, who joined us from the Philippines some years back, has been a nurse in Ashern, and then primary care. He’s a nurse practitioner, also providing and stabilizing services and outreach in that area
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mellis: in February of 2024,
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mellis: 36 emergency department shifts were covered by local positions. So
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mellis: I do want to acknowledge and apologize. And I know it’s frustrating on highway 6 going into Easter we had significant shortages of physicians.
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mellis: We had a physician and paternity leave from Ashern, and we had a physician on vacation.
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mellis: so there were only 3 physicians left.
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mellis: and really to run clinics to look after dialysis.
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mellis: to look after inpatients and primary care. It wasn’t possible to have the emerge open as much as we would want it to be. We always look at least have an emerge open between Eriksdale and Ashern.
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mellis: and not that area for access.
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mellis: And then we had a physician on whether deserved vacation and Eric’s still as well. So
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mellis: I feel the next time that we have a block like that. Not I feel I want to make a commitment that. I will let you know in advance, so you can let community know as well. And it’s not that we think it’s okay.
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mellis: Right now, we have 64 physicians who have license to practice with us, who are on our locum roster, now approximately 6 to 10 of those are more inclined to pick up at the moment, because sometimes people are on the roster, and they have other reasons they might have picked up a couple of years back. They’re still available to us. We still outreach to them. So it wasn’t like we passively accept
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mellis: that there’ll be a paternity leave and vacation. We do knock on doors to see if we can get locums to come and help us, and we weren’t successful with that.
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mellis: And again, I know that’s
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mellis: that’s frustrating for you to know and hear.
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mellis: So what are we going to do about this? So, moving forward.
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mellis: we all talk about IMGs and international medical grads. There’s going to be 6 new physicians coming this year in late August, early September.
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mellis: and we’re expecting 7 more coming in the same timeframe in 2025
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mellis: moving on nursing.
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mellis: So about a year ago, or maybe 18 months ago, there was a program started, called the UNEs. It was the undergrad nursing employees.
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mellis: and it was something that’s been done. We’d seen another. Well, Alberta, some of us had looked at it for years. But action was taken about 18 months ago to introduce a similar program
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mellis: here in Manitoba. So these are Rn. Students and LPN students. So in their final years, I know it says third year here, and the LPNs go for 2 years, but in their towards the end of their studies
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mellis: for a degree. Nurses, it might be their third or fourth year. They are paid to do clinical placements in our inpatient units.
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mellis: and it started slowly, and we learned as we went as a province.
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mellis: and initially we only had, I think, one
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mellis: to. I don’t want to make this up, and it was in our surgery unit because we only we had to put them into units where there was stable leadership. Or initially, it was. You can only have an inpatient psych unit, an inpatient medicine or inpatient surgery. And that’s how we had to start slow and learn. So now there has been requests
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mellis: for kind of placement in Stonewall and in Beausejour so it’s growing.
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mellis: And there’s also provincial float pool. So some of the nurses hired to that 66% are from agencies and may still be with agencies.
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mellis: But out of those hired
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mellis: there’s 5 that are full-time, and the rest 120 are casual, and 3 of those full-time
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mellis: float pool nurses are working in our region, and we’re glad to have them because it offers some stability.
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mellis: So when we move forward with primary care, access?
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mellis: But we know we have pressures, and we know that when patients are needing surgery or they need cat scans, and they need a more fulsome workup.
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mellis: That is a lot to put on a primary care physician covering a merger inpatients. So of course, they have to come to Selkirk, and sometimes, when people are really really unwell, they need to go to the city.
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mellis: So
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mellis: the former hospital, which is on a hundred Eastern drive, the old Selkirk Hospital.
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mellis: Since patients vacated it, we’ve been able to do some renovation work in there, and we have needed that space
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mellis: for some services. We have home care services and some mental health services. We had in a different area of Selkirk.
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mellis: and one of the landlords have given us notice.
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mellis: and our facilities manager had looked to see if there was anywhere else we could get affordable rent, and we couldn’t. So we did a little bit of movement. We you. We moved some of them into health team out of 4 4, 6, Main Street in Selkirk.
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mellis: and anyway into a different place, and we moved home care into the former hospital.
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mellis: Our cancer navigation services, which really works with anybody who’s
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mellis: had a diagnostic that looks like it’s cancer or work with our primary care. Who might need to say, you know, I’m new to this province and new to this region, and it’s highly likely that this person has X type of cancer. They would walk with our cancer navigators, and they would take away barriers to move that patient in an expedient way through the system.
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mellis: So they are moved into the old hospital. There’s a couple of them, and they’re for the region. Palliative care is moved in speech, language, and therapy services. So we’re really looking at how that farmer hospital
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mellis: can be
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mellis: can be space that can be used, and we’re glad to have it. And we know that many parts of the world would think that that was a wonderful building. And again, these are provincial services, but it’s more affordable to have them in that space. And how can we harness the capacity of that building.
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mellis: So we’re now talking about primary care access. Some of these support primary care, just like we’ve mentioned
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mellis: right now, going back to our first theme about partnerships. We’re expanding access for rehab services through technology and partnerships. There’s going to be Telerehab, based out of Ashern
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mellis: Pinaymootang First Nation, Eriksdale Hospital and Lake Manitoba First Nations.
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mellis: And we’re going to be having that. We have person come to our region every 2 weeks, and I think that there’s going to be more of an announcement with this from
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mellis: Oh, my God, help me, Kit, I can’t think of the name.
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khodgson: Riverview Health Centre and the College of Rehab Sciences.
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mellis: Bless you, Kate, and is there anything else you want to say about this, Kate? Who is going to be coming every 2 weeks? Kate.
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khodgson: Yeah. So in the plaid. Good afternoon, everyone in the plaid shirt here is Tim Romanec. He’s a fairly recently graduated physiotherapist, and he will be in communities every second week and then providing tele rehab with on-site rehab assistance in community while he’s in Riverview, and he’ll be working with a team in Riverview, as well as with those rehab assistance in community.
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mellis: Thank you. And, Kate, can you tell people who you are? Do you mind? I’m sorry.
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khodgson: Yes. Sorry. That’s okay. Kate Hodgson. Regional lead for community and continuing care.
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mellis: Thank you very much, Kate. Appreciate you doing that, and Allies help us in case portfolio.
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mellis: So one of the other things that we know we’ve had feedback from our 17 of the 34 first nations in Southern Manitoba
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mellis: are in Interlake.
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mellis: and sometimes when people come in, especially if English and their elder or second language. It hasn’t felt like our areas are always friendly and inviting. That’s feedback we’ve got. And that’s the perception. And people’s perceptions we take seriously. So here we have Adam Sanderson.
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mellis: He’s our corporate calling regional director for indigenous health. Adam used to be the health director out of Sagkeeng, and then some of you know, Robert Maytwayashing, and he was a former chief in Lake Manitoba, first nation.
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mellis: and Robert has done many of our cultural education training for first nations. And he, we’ve had patients. Say I would like somebody to smudge with me. They’re dying. That might be in our hospitals, and they’re going. I really would like somebody to pray in Anishinabe, and just feeling a little bit alone in some spaces. So Robert is available for that.
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mellis: Then Andrea Swan is the indigenous liaison person working out of action.
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mellis: and Andrea is originally from Lake Manitoba, and then Cheryl Sinclair. Cheryl Sinclair is from Lake St. Martin, working with our medical withdrawal program. It’s in-house right now at the moment in Ashern. And we know we’re doing renovations in Ashern. So Cheryl is working out of there and working with clients and patients who come through
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mellis: from that area as well. And just to mention Andrea works out of Eriksdale and
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mellis: the last time I was an ash and I missed her. She was in Eriksdale , and we might have passed in the highway. But,
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mellis: I don’t think I even waved. I wasn’t aware of what she was driving, anyway. So we’re we’ve had positive feedback from patients and people accessing care. But it’s nice to have somebody when there’s questions, and we know that for all of us, even in the jobs all of us are in, it is lovely to be able to call somebody who you feel safe. What to say. I’m struggling with a decision here, and I want to know am I right, or what am I not considering? That’s just the way of a supportive environment.
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mellis: So for project updates right now.
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mellis: And this is Selkirk Hospital. And again, this is our regional center.
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mellis: And just this, you can see that it’s much more finished than it was before, and these are picks from the architects and then onto the next one is ashen. We know that we’re increasing in patient capacity and ashen. Ashern is at a different stage. It’s on track, though, for its timelines. So this is the what will be our 26 bed inpatient unit for ashen. Just so that you’re aware that it is still happening.
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mellis: So, Julie, I think you’re next on this to talk a little bit about the micro credential course. We do get people saying to us, You’re increasing beds
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mellis: we. I’ve already shown you that we’ve an agent population, and one of the first questions we get is, if you have more people aging
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mellis: you vacancies at the moment, what are you going to do to strengthen home care. And what are you going to do to strengthen the workforce? So, Julian, do you want to share a little bit about this? Some of you may have be aware of this. Maybe some of you aren’t, so we’ll just do a quick overview. Thank you.
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Julene: Thank you. Thank you, Marion. So my name’s Julene Sawatzky. I’m the regional lead for human resources here in Interlake Eastern. So just over a year ago we sent out a survey to communities that asked, you know, are you interested in different roles in the commute, in in healthcare? What are some of the barriers to joining healthcare to accessing training? And what that showed us is that there are people potentially interested, but that there are barriers, distance to training
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Julene: the cost of training the loss of wages while you’re training.
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Julene: And so we thought, let’s do a pilot project. That’s within our control to say, what happens when we remove the barriers where we go to, where people are in communities
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Julene: and see if they will, they will come work with us. So you can go to the next slide. What we did is we pulled out we developed a curriculum to a micro credential for healthcare, with the intent of filling vacancies and long term care and home care. So we gathered a pool of retired nurses who are willing to lend their experience to these students. And we went to 6 communities in
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Julene: in the fiscal year 2324, as a pilot project to see what would happen if we went and knocked on doors. And I mean this physically, not metaphorically, literally went. And our small but mighty team of recruiters to people to say, are you interested? We provide 3 weeks of training. Excuse me where
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Julene: you are taught how to operate as a ho as a healthcare for home care, long term care, and so 2 weeks in classroom and a week of practicum right in your community. So we bring the equipment and the trainers to the community. And what we found is that there were people that wanted to do this people were coming from.
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Julene: and they’re not being employed working in the service industry. Maybe their kids went back to school recently. Maybe they’re recently retired. We had a wide range of demographics that were interested in these opportunities. So we learned as we went, and
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Julene: we were able to get them to take place, and you can see our last 2 in Lac du Bonnet and in Selkirk. The effect was that we went in homecare and Lac du Bonnet from 26% vacancy to 13%. And in Selkirk from 27% to 20. So this was a real opportunity for us to trial something.
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Julene: Once they’ve worked 300 h. They’re eligible for a bridging program that gets them. Then into they can take to become certified, and then they could. They could also work in in acute care if they so desired. So I see a hand up. I’m happy to take a question right away, if you like.
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C K: Hi, Cindy calendar lock to Bonnie.
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C K: Hi, okay. So you’re aware I’m going to jump all over the place here, maybe a little bit. So bear with me. You’re aware of the announcement for the PCH, and we’re gonna be looking at significant
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C K: human resources.
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Julene: Yes.
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C K: Lac du Bonnet has been working to with the Assiniboine College to get healthcare aid and LPN training.
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C K: so what I’m hearing from you then being that this micro course was delivered out to Lac du Bonnet. Red River brought their equipment out. Is there an opportunity to do more of that?
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C K: Considering. We’ve only got 2 years to get our LPNs
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C K: And healthcare aids established.
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Julene: Yeah, thank you. So just to clarify no college was involved in this. This was the IERHA who developed this curriculum. Based off of what WHRA has done in the past and a few other organizations so that we could. And we took our own equipment into the to the communities.
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Julene: So certainly this was a pilot project, and what the goal is in the next year to roll it out aggressive target of 10 times. But you’re exactly right. There is an opportunity to do this more. It was interesting to see that there are people within communities who are interested in doing this work, and I will talk about the LPN. And certified healthcare in a minute through Assiniboine Community College.
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Julene: Because that’s exactly. I think this is exactly the type of program that’s needed to fill those upcoming vacancies where it’s you, you could think ahead, right? Develop from within and then move into yeah.
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mellis: And Julian, we got feedback. I remember I got feedback in too long. Got feedback.
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mellis: There was the Rm. Of West Winter Lake had a meeting, and we were invited to it, and it was that day. It was an Eric Stale, and it goes between Eric Stale and Ashern, and some retired nurses had come up to us and said, there are many people not just don’t just target high schools. There are people who’ve raised their kids. Their kids are in school. They’re in their forties.
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mellis: maybe fifties, and they’re very capable of looking after children and seniors. And what about giving them opportunities? So this is. This is like a 3 week course, and it’s things like you know how to lift without injuring a patient without injuring yourself how to prepare and care for somebody in a very basic way.
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mellis: But then, if people want to get certified, they get a higher salary for that. So we want to fill every home, care vacant position at the moment in the region, and strengthen our foundation, and also then
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mellis: build opportunities for people and confidence because it might springboard people into then taken a 5 month
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mellis: healthcare, a course that’s offered either by Assiniboine or Red River. And that’s what we’re really focusing at the moment.
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mellis: Right Julene?
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Julene: Yeah, absolutely. And the nice thing is because we work so closely with the managers at the site because we’re in the community providing the education that we know what’s working and not working. We hear back from the managers. Okay, we need to up this skill set so we can adapt that into the curriculum which is really good. So we know that we’re providing that the right type of training to students who come to then work.
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Julene: Do you have another question. Happy to discuss.
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C K: Well, I actually, I have a lot of questions. So I think what I will do.
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Julene: Connect.
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C K: We’ve got the AMM this week. I’ll get in touch with you when I’m back, because I don’t wanna take up your time on the care home when there’s so many other people, so I’ll leave it till then.
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Julene: Yeah, absolutely. And I’ll maybe put my contact information in the chat. I don’t know Laura Loop. Maybe you can do that, and then let’s have a discussion. That sounds great.
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mellis: Might wanted to. Julene, what’s your cell phone number? Shout it out.
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Julene: (204) 599-9255. Still, we’ll put it in the chat. But that’s this is exactly right. We have found communities very engaged with this. And actually just surprised honestly, of how many people want to do this. So our last cohort and silk was 16 people. It was actually too big. We like about 8 to 10 people in a class, but
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Julene: we weren’t gonna turn them away. So it just there’s a I think, a real opportunity. It’s people who, you know. Maybe we’re I mean, we need people working at the gas station, too. But that’s where we went. We just talked to people working at fast food. We talked to people. And like, I said, knocked on doors. So yeah.
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Julene: okay, let’s keep going.
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Julene: to the next slide, please.
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Julene: So of course, we don’t just need one way of addressing workforce issues. We need many ways. And another way is, of course, the Philippines recruitment effort that I’m sure you’ve all heard about on the news. So here’s a few photos for of folks who have showed up to our region. So really, wanna say, thank you to
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Julene: everybody. In all the communities that have been helping us out. We could not do this without you. So I think even this weekend there was somebody from the
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Julene: The fire department in Pine Falls helping a family move from a temporary spot to a permanent spot. So you know, it just takes all of us together.
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mellis: And that firefighter, you know he’s originally from Sagkeeng, and he did it as a volunteer, and he make no big deal of it, you know, because I’d heard somebody from the community tell me about it later Friday night. So that’s right. And all of you people are donating as well. Furniture.
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Julene: Helping with grocery runs all of those things, you know. It’s a large adjustment for these folks, and just really appreciate the welcome that all of the communities have provided and go to the next slide.
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Julene: So this is just a list of the folks who have come so far we’ve had 16 to date. We have another 3 in the queue with their flights booked in the next month or so, and then we have 8 more that potentially could come.
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Julene: So that’s kind of the status where we’re at right now again, if anyone wants to reach out to discuss particulars in your community. Different issues. Happy to pick up the phone or come for a visit. We can have those.
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mellis: The only thing Julene is, it looks like we’re contradicting ourselves. We have the list of 16. But then we have over in the corner 7, 17 health care aids and 2 nurses. So a total 19, I think.
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Julene: 16 or that have actually landed in the communities. And those are the communities. 19 is including the 3. We have flights booked. So they’re coming, and that includes 17 health grades and 2 nurses. So there was just 3 that are in the queue and that brings us to that 19, and then additional 8 that may come. Thank you for that clarification.
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Julene: I think we can go to the next slide.
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Julene: So as Cindy was mentioning. We work closely with our partners. Cinema community College, Red River College, there was a virtual healthcare course that started in January through Red River partnership of Fieldstone ventures and then Assiniboine Community College has. They have a rotating rural site in each of the regions. So we have
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Julene: an LPN course with dedicated funding for IERHA, and it was in Arborg for 2 cohorts, and that was the first time for us, and that was
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Julene: really. Wanna say, thank you to the community of Arborg and to Julie Berger Fieldstone ventures for making that happen. That was a very big project, and those are graduating now. And that’s had a large impact on recruitment in the region. And then that’s moving to Bose with the LPN. Starting in January of 2025. So there’s active recruitment for that as well as there’s healthcare aid program starting in September of 2024. So also working on recruitment for that.
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Julene: And then just mentioning the additional micro credential opportunities. So you’re certainly gonna see those social media posters in your community. If you think there’s people we need to be talking to if there’s better ways, you think we can get the word out in your particular community. Please do reach out we wanna be very much. You know your community’s best, and we wanna be as embedded as possible and be successful in in supporting the community.
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Julene: That’s it for me, if you, unless there’s other questions.
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mellis: That’s kind of it. I know this was quick today, and we say we always look forward to hearing from you. And there’s an email address, see? Or [email protected], and many of you.
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mellis: Somebody has raised their hand. Peter, you’ve raised your hand.
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Peter Truijen: Yes, I’m wondering.
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Peter Truijen: I had a speaking to a resident here in Weston. Paul. I’m the mayor of Weston Paul.
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Peter Truijen: and they were laying out a situation that happened to them.
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Peter Truijen: They were taken to this Interlake Regional Hospital by ambulance.
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Peter Truijen: and I guess what is the protocol for those attendance in the in the ambulance? Are they supposed to stay with the patient? And what’s the reason for them staying with the patient?
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mellis: So ems and ambulances are managed by shared health.
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mellis: But, Peter, I’m wondering if I should not call you and get the details, cause I’m not sure what that means. Often people stay with the patient. When they pick them up, they take them to the hospital, and until somebody receives that patient, they stay with them, but it depends on the condition of the patient. So if they felt the patient was stable, this is just the at a glance.
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mellis: And, Kate, you were there too. You used to manage Selkirk Hospital, so feel free to step in, but if the patient was stable and
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mellis: could be looked after in the emergency department. Sometimes we have people brought in, and they’re stable enough to wait in the waiting room, but I don’t know the details of this one. So I really should reach out and get the name of the patient and follow up with that. If there was a concern right, Peter.
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Peter Truijen: Yes. Yes. Okay.
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mellis: And Peter, what’s you do? You probably don’t. You can maybe send your email in case all these people will be phoning you to the CEO strategy at IERHA, and then either I or somebody from Selkirk Hospital will call you and find out what it is. That’s concerning this case. Okay.
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Peter Truijen: The CEO strategy. Okay, I’ll.
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mellis: It’s on here. But in case but I’ll tell you what, why don’t I give you my cell phone number area code 204,
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mellis: 4, 8, 5,
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mellis: 0, 1, 6, 6.
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mellis: And then you can text me. And then I can call you okay.
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Peter Truijen: Okay can do. So it’s a.
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mellis: Twice as I did that I got a phone call. You’re not 808, are you? 1204808, no.
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Peter Truijen: No, I’m not. No.
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mellis: No, somebody else is just calling me right now. But I won’t answer. This is my priority.
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Peter Truijen: So your number. So your telephone number is 204485,
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Peter Truijen: 0, 1, 6, 6.
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mellis: Correct.
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Peter Truijen: Okay. Great.
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mellis: Pleased to meet you, Peter.
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Peter Truijen: Yep, thank you.
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mellis: Thank you.
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mellis: Okay,
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mellis: any other comments. So this was just on the surface. We our efforts are to keep the doors open, and the best way to do that is test staff to be able to provide the services. I know that.
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mellis: Some of you here on this call and or that some of your communities? It’s more challenged sometimes. And we have different periods where sometimes we have minimal vacancies in an area, and then we have greater vacancies in an area.
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mellis: However, the way you’re making people feel welcome, and the way you’re working with is even with this Filipino recruitment. Julian said it, but
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mellis: there’s even work you do behind the scenes that we don’t know about, and we thank you for that.
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mellis: No question is a wrong question. So
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mellis: please ask. And if you’re not comfortable asking in public again on this Powerpoint, here is the
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mellis: email address where you can reach out to a CEO [email protected], and you had Julie and
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mellis: cell phone number to in case you need to connect with her about recruitment or things you’re worried about, and if she’s not the right person for whatever it is or I’m not, we’ll bring in the right person to answer the questions more accurately.
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mellis: See no other hands up. Want to thank you for this, and don’t look at the sun without your glasses. Somebody has a raised hand. CK.
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C K: That Cindy Calendar again just I was just wondering you recorded the meeting. Where will we be able to find the link after.
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mellis: Laura Lou, do you want to answer that.
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Lauralou: We’ll be sharing the link by email, Cindy. All the folks who are invited to the meeting will get copy of that. And we do post information online. So we’ll share that link, too.
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C K: Okay, wonderful. Thank you.
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mellis: Thanks, Laura Lou. Thanks for that, Cindy.
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mellis: And then, if you’re going to the AMM. Drive carefully and have a good productive meeting. Thank you everybody nice to see some of you online, even though we see you in person, sometimes.
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mellis: Missed you in person on Wednesday last. But I see you’re here. Okay.
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mellis: if there’s nothing else, we thank you.
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mellis: Okay.
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Mayor Les Barclay Powerview Pinefalls: Have a good day.
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mellis: Thank you. Everybody. Thank you.
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pam: Thank you.
