Mon Apr 14,2008
By Rob Ferguson and Tess Kalinowski
Ontario's 150 hospitals are getting an extra $667.2 million this year from Queen's Park but it won't be enough to stop up to 220 job cuts – including 72 nurses – at Rouge Valley Health System or prevent cuts at other hospitals, officials warn.
The money announced yesterday by Health Minister George Smitherman was pledged in last month's Ontario budget and is the government's annual funding increase for the sector that now gets $14.4 billion a year in taxpayer support.
Hospitals welcomed the infusion, but doubted it would be enough to avoid cuts given huge inflationary pressures in health care, such as spiralling drug costs.
"For a good chunk of the hospitals, it's going to be difficult to balance their budgets," said Tom Closson, president of the Ontario Hospital Association.
Hospitals must balance their budgets under provincial law, even if it requires layoffs or other cuts, with the province occasionally sending in consultants to look for savings.
However, it will take several days before all hospitals know where they stand because 14 provincial agencies known as Local Health Integration Networks (LHINs) are in charge of deciding how much is given to hospitals in their regions. Amounts could be announced as early as today.
Smitherman's announcement yesterday detailed only how much each LHIN is getting from the $667.2 million pot, which includes a 4.9 per cent general funding increase for hospitals plus $170 million later this year to reduce long emergency ward wait times, for a total increase of 6.1 per cent.
"At the moment, it's hard for us to judge," Closson said, speaking of potential cuts.
Some of the funding increase is targeted for hospitals in fast-growing areas, more surgeries, more MRI and CT scans, with the Central East LHIN that oversees Rouge Valley, among others, getting an above-average funding increase of 7 per cent or $76.7 million.
Smitherman cautioned against panic about threatened cuts, saying hospitals like Rouge Valley haven't laid anyone off yet and insisting "we will continue to work with our hospital partners ... to ensure that the health-care needs of Ontarians are met."
With campuses in Scarborough and Ajax-Pickering, Rouge Valley is going ahead with its three-year plan, which includes up to 36 bed closings, after overspending in the last few years pushed it $78 million into the red, a spokesperson said.
"Rouge Valley is going to continue to address our financial challenges directly," said public affairs director David Brazeau, noting the actual number of layoffs may be low because of retirements, attrition and buyout packages offered to staff.
"We remain focused to implement our plan to improve our effectiveness and eliminate our deficit."
That's to be expected, said Joe Dickson, the Liberal MPP for Ajax-Pickering, who revealed Rouge Valley's share of yesterday's announcement is $2.15 million to reduce wait times and an amount yet to be decided to help it deal with the area's fast-growing population.
Smitherman said the funding wasn't meant to address financial issues and threatened layoffs at Rouge Valley but suggested it could have some impact.
Opposition parties were suspicious of Smitherman's decision to make a routine announcement on a Sunday, dubbing it an attempt to quell controversy that arose last week over the government's management of health care – particularly nursing – after a Star story on the planned Rouge Valley cuts.
"It was a bit of damage control where he had to show some reassurance," said NDP health critic France Gélinas (Nickel Belt).
Critics said it made no sense that a government planning to hire 9,000 nurses by 2011 to improve patient care was allowing a hospital to cut 72 nursing positions.
Calling the Rouge Valley situation, "the tip of the iceberg," Conservative MPP Elizabeth Witmer (Kitchener-Waterloo) said yesterday's announcement does nothing to guarantee more nurses won't be laid off and lost through attrition. "We've got huge, huge problems and this minister, who promised all sorts of things simply hasn't delivered."
Nurses remain vigilant about their job prospects at Rouge Valley and elsewhere as hospitals try to balance their budgets while juggling increasing demands from a growing and aging population.
"Hospitals are in some cases using vacancies and not posting them to reduce the number of nursing hours," said Linda Haslam-Stroud, president of the Ontario Nurses' Association, a union representing about 50,000 hospital nurses.
"At the end of the day they're reducing nursing hours and reducing nursing hours will reduce nursing care hours to our patients," she added, noting the aging population means the number of seriously ill patients nurses now see "far outweighs what we saw five years ago."
Every full-time nursing job equates to about 2,000 hours annually of patient care, she said.
"We simply cannot decrease the number of nursing positions, not by layoffs and not by attrition, if we are to deliver on safe and quality patient care," said Doris Grinspun, executive director of the Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario.
The government's funding increase for this year compares with a 3.7 per cent or $495 million hike last year. Although specifics on most hospital funding allocations were not available, the University Health Network – including Princess Margaret, Toronto General, and Toronto Western Hospital – is in line for $5.5 million; St. Michael's Hospital will get $2.08 million and Mount Sinai will get $2.52 million.
York Central Hospital will receive $5.1 million in new funding while it undergoes the first phase of an expansion that will add 122 beds, medical imaging services and a renovated emergency room next year.
The hospital's fast-growing service area already includes about 400,000 people in an area that is growing by about 30,000 to 40,000 people annually, according to hospital president Bruce Harber.
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