Discussions

Here's hoping that Brian Pallister and Penny Gilson look at better management to reduce costs,if layoffs/cut backs are needed I would hope that they start with the people that ride the office chair all day and not the ones on their feet all day and maybe offer a retirement incentive for those who wish to leave. If its available for Manitoba Hydro it should be there for the RHA

Pallister needs to be careful to not cut services that are desperately needed! If he hurts front line services the Conservatives will never be elected again in Manitoba.  
 
The employees at the hospital work so hard! Patients don't stop coming and they need to be looked after! You don't know how hard they work until you have a loved one in the hospital. They never stop!

Prairie Mountain Health management is very top heavy. Shady management staff who are barely qualified to do their jobs and are clipboard huggers. Many people HATE working at Brandon hospital due to poor management.  
 
There should be an AUDIT looking into "bonuses" handed to the management staff and other spending within that RHA in order to identify where the money actually goes.  
 
I have often seen "lunches" and "suppers" for the management staff provided by the hospital cafeteria and local restaurants which were not paid by the management staff.  
 
I only hope that this government will stop the RHA from cutting non-management positions.  
 
Edited by Desertnewf, 2017-03-04 12:30:28

I can tell you where most of the money is going.  
Management yes, but also, look at how much money goes to paying staff double-time every single day, because staff are calling in sick (whether they really are or not), and part time and casual staff refuse to pick up shifts, so it goes to overtime(volunteered or mandated). Then the ones who work overtime get burned out, and they now call in sick... and it soon becomes a vicious circle.  
Am I right or no?

You're right. A ton of money is spent that way. During the summer they were paying overtime/ double time for several people per floor per day.

if its a problem document it and discipline is required by management. Management has to manage not just say there is a problem.

You can log sick time all you want. Doesn't do nothing against the unions. I made a point about the amount of call in for the Brandon School Division. When everyone does it do you discipline everyone for taking a benefit that the union pushed for? Amazing how many one day colds people take. The shitty thing is the employee games that are played and trying to manage them as a manager. Everyone loves overtime. Now I don't know if a trend is during certain periods of the year or what. My busy season is summer. Lots of OT but missed days cause the guys seem to care less because OT covers the missed days. You hire more people then they actually show up everyday and now you are overstaffed. It is tough to play the balancing act. Winter comes.....the most prone time for sickness yet no OT and with sick days at 66% it hurts more on your pay......guess what....less missed days.

I have nurse friends that say everyday they aren't scheduled they get phone calls to pick up shifts for "sick" workers. When did we become a generation of laziness and people calling in sick every second week for one day?  
 
My company doesn't pay for sick days and people only stay home if they are legitimately sick. We get 3 "flex days" for 1 year which people can use as sick days and that's it. We have to bank overtime and take it as sick time when we are sick. It's unbelievable how "sick" people really are when they get paid sick days vs unpaid.

There are a small number of people in every profession and every sector (private and public) who abuse their sick time, or use up all their sick days. However, the vast majority do not.  
Another thing to take into account within the health care sector is transmitting illness to patients. A mild viral upper respiratory illness (ie - the common cold), when transmitted to someone with a compromised immune system, could be fatal.

Another thing to consider is not all sick time is paid. If you are someone who uses your sick time a lot - those benefits run out quick. As far as nurses are concerned. Look at the hours they work. Nurses are being mandated to stay and work overtime hours on top of their 12 hit shift they worked. When you are mandated you have to stay. No choice on the matter. So it's easy to get run down and sick. I don't think blaming nurses using sick time is fair. I blame the government. Look at the crisis our health care system is in now and they want to make cuts?

Regarding sick time. There will always be those that abuse it. I only know of the school division as I have reviewed their budget and they put out their info very clearly, good and bad. I still am thinking about searching out the health cares budget to take a peak. I know that sick days in the BSD made up for 40% of the same day monthly call ins. How many were for just the day, Fridays, Mondays, before vacation, before long weekends, etc? Same with the heath trade. Would be interesting to know that. That is where abusers start to be found. I don't know how many people have just one day colds or flu. Sick days lead to a lot of OT worked so they are tied together. Would they save hiring more part time positions just cause of the amount of sick days called in? That could reduce OT costs potentially. Savings in wages yet more workers? Everyone says start at the top down for cuts. Sure there may be too much upper management. I looked quickly at a pdf online for wages back in 2013 or something. For the first half dozen pages the wage earners were all doctors, maybe one admin. It wasn't until the 125 grand and under I started seeing office staff. Now I didn't count how many but I am sure some could be consolidated. When paying OT on a doctor making over half a million a year how quick does that add up? Sometimes management makes up the smallest cost.  
 
Ex. BSD-90 mill budget yet management comes in at 3 mill. or 3% of the budget. Not too much savings there.

To the shady comment from first hand knowledge but I do have friends and know of people who are among the very hard workers on that staff of the PMH. They do work hard - they put up with a lot of garbage (including the typical union fueled BS - but that is another thread).  
 
But I agree the comment is dead on about bonuses and upper management perks and about the PMHA being extremely top heavy.  
 
Just look at the staff parking lots on any stat holiday - they are EMPTY. While my daughter was in surgery a few years back on one of these holidays I heard the comment on more than one occasion that there is so much upper management that is eats into the actual health operating budget.  
 
We had fantastic care while she was in, BTW. Never once did we have to wait un-necessarily for the nurses, doctors, maintenance, etc - so it was not that the whole hospital was run on bare staff.  
 
I do also think that maybe the time has come to have a separate triage and doctors or nurse practitioners office on site of hospitals to get the incorrect users out of the way of real emergencies in ER's.  
 
I have only needed to use Er services three times in the last 15 years, and never had to wait more than 15-20 minutes because they were serious issues, but I have witnessed many, many people in the ER that had no reason to be there - and they are the ones screaming about wait times.  
 
I do disagree with the Pallister governments' recent shutting down of the urgent care clinics in St Boniface - they need to be running MORE of these places to keep these people out of the hospitals. But not with huge management overhead - these can be run with nurse practitioners and fewer doctors to keep costs down.  
 
I also agree with pharmacists being able to dispense drugs for non life threatening or pre existing conditions. People on birth control usually have zero reason to go into a doctor for just a refill pres:cription. Some Shoppers Drug Marts now can do site tests for strep, and dispense the first round of antibiotics as needed. I think this needs to be expanded to other less serious issues. Pink eye, skin infections, pain med refills that do not involve opioids should be added to the list just to start.  
 
I am absolutely thrilled that I can now skip the doctors clinics and go right into Safeway and have my flu shots, or Shingles, or other shots done there at my convenience. Those are things I do not need to waste government money on a visit to a doc. I think all travel vaccines should also be done that way as well - because the RHA soaks you for ridiculous fees just to get these vaccine scrips, then they charge you to get the shot too - it is double dipping at it's worst.

Several years ago the RHA's amalgamated to save money. I would like to know how much money has been saved? Positions within upper management were supposed to be eliminated - how many positions were really cut or were upper management just shuffled around and no positions were actually eliminated. Departments were spread throughout the PMH region ie Accts Payable in one community, HR in another community etc How much time do upper management spend travelling throughout the PMH region to meet with these Depts.? Why do management travel so much to Wpg for meetings when Skype and conference calling is available. It's not just wages for staff but the benefits that workers get are unbelievable. Rule of 80 for early retirement. Plus a years salary upon retirement called severance pay or called some other ridiculous thing ! It is easy to be generous with tax payer money.