The shortage of personnel continues to hit the health network hard. At the psychiatric unit of the Lakeshore General Hospital in Pointe-Claire, the doors have been closed for a week due to a lack of psychiatrists, to the chagrin of the employees, but especially the families of the patients.
“It’s a trauma for patients to have to change hospitals,” laments Fabienne Bourque, the mother of a patient with Down’s syndrome who has been treated twice in psychiatry at the Lakeshore General Hospital in recent years.
On December 2, patients from the psychiatric unit of the Lakeshore General Hospital in Pointe-Claire, in the West Island of Montreal, were transferred to the Douglas Mental Health University Institute. No notice was given to the employees, who were notified the same day.
“Employees are very worried following this temporary closure,” says Johanne Riendeau, president of the Union of Health Care Professionals of the West Island of Montreal.
“Although this decision was not easy, it was the right one to provide quality services to our patients, due to a lack of psychiatrists,” he told The Press Hélène Bergeron-Gamache, public relations officer at the CIUSSS de l’Ouest-de-l’Île-de-Montréal.
An “essential” psychiatric unit
The CIUSSS maintains that this reorganization is temporary. “We will reintegrate the patients as soon as the situation allows it,” said Ms.me Bergeron-Gamache. “The Lakeshore psychiatric wing is essential for the community. I’m really afraid that they will close it permanently, ”worries, however, the mother Fabienne Bourque.
Her son has always had impeccable care at the Lakeshore, she said. The young man has eating behavior problems and refuses to eat several foods. When he was housed in the psychiatric unit, a worker accompanied him daily to the cafeteria and made him choose the food he wanted. “The Lakeshore is a community. It’s smaller. They can afford to take the time they need with patients,” she says.
She fears having to take her son with Down syndrome to the Douglas Mental Health University Institute.
It is a stress for the patients, who may need even more services, because they have been transferred further.
Fabienne Bourque, mother
With the transfer of patients, “perhaps some families will not be able to visit their loved ones as often,” she laments. About a 30-minute drive is needed to get from the Lakeshore General Hospital to the Douglas Mental Health University Institute.
Recurring staff shortages
The Association of Psychiatric Physicians of Quebec has entrusted to be “concerned” and to follow “the situation closely with all the authorities involved”, declared the director general, Martine Dériger. The CIUSSS assured them that measures have been taken to properly orient patients affected by the closure, she said.
To the extent that patients have access to quality services in a safe location, the issue of location of service may be an inconvenience, but does not put individuals at significant risk.
Martine Dériger, Executive Director of the Association of Psychiatric Physicians of Quebec
The CIUSSS reminds that at any time, a person in distress can go to the emergency room of the hospital of their choice to receive help.
The Lakeshore General Hospital faces recurring problems of staff shortages. In a report issued on October 11 on the emergency room of the hospital, the situation was described as a real “ticking time bomb”. There was then a shortage of 56 full-time equivalents in the emergency room, i.e. 52% of the positions. In June, the lack of nursing staff also raised fears of service interruptions.