BCNU stresses nurse-to-patient ratios during rally at oft-closed Nicola Valley Hospital

MERRITT B.C. — Last year alone, the Nicola Valley Hospital in Merritt’s emergency room was closed 17 times due to staffing shortages. Already in 2024, the hospital’s emergency department has been shuttered twice more.

A lunchtime rally was held outside of the hospital on Wednesday (April 17), with the nurses who help keep the facility running demanding better working conditions and proper staffing.

“It is the responsibility of this employer to ensure that the working conditions are safe,” said BC Nurses Union President Adriane Gear. “What I have been learning from speaking with nurses that work at Nicola Valley Hospital is that they don’t feel safe, and they have been raising those concerns and they have fallen on deaf ears. That would be one tangible example of how you retain nurses — you respect them, you value them and you keep them safe.”

With the Merritt hospital’s staffing vacancies topping 50 per cent, Gear stressed needing to make promised nurse-to-patient ratios a reality.

“We know from other jurisdictions that have successfully implemented ratios that nurses come back to nursing. It improves working conditions, it makes it so you can provide the desperately needed care to your patients, it reduces nurse injury rates, it reduces length of stay, it reduces patient mortality. For us, that is the long game. That is what has to happen,” said Gear.

The rally, which was well supported by local residents, also brought out B.C.’s official opposition party and Fraser-Nicola MLA Jackie Tegart, who addressed the systemic issues in Merritt.

“We are open to listen to anybody’s ideas. We want big and bold. We know that the system is in crisis, the system is chaos and that the system needs to change,” Tegart told CFJC News.

Alongside Tegart was Kamloops-North Thompson MLA Peter Milobar and BC United Health Critic Shirley Bond, who spoke to the need for government to step up and support the nurses.

“These issues are not about them. They are working hard every single day and they are holding the system together,” said Bond. “Today is about expressing gratitude, hearing about the concerns that healthcare professionals are experiencing and I want to make it very clear, we are grateful. This is not about them. This is about a system that is broken.”

With staffing challenges persisting and no guarantee of keeping the ER open, Gear says there is plenty of blame to go around.

“It lies at a whole bunch of people’s feet, including the health authority, for sure government, but we are in an unprecedented nursing shortage. It’s not just in this province. It’s across the country,” said Gear. “We have an opportunity to turn it around with ratios.”