The emergency situation at the Lakeshore General Hospital in Pointe-Claire is “very difficult” and “crystallized in bad habits,” an independent investigation report revealed Thursday. In order to improve these conditions, a modular building will temporarily accommodate emergencies next November.
Independent investigator Francine Dupuis noted “significant shortcomings” in the organization of services and made 135 recommendations, she announced at a press conference on Thursday.
She reports a toxic “culture” in the ER, including many tensions between professionals, executives, emergency physicians and specialists. “A lot of energy is devoted to defending oneself and blaming the other”, notes the investigator in her report.
PHOTO ROBERT SKINNER, THE PRESS
Independent investigator Francine Dupuis, Thursday at a press conference
In February, the daily Montreal Gazette revealed that there had been an increasing number of patient deaths over the past four years that ER staff believed could have been prevented and whose true circumstances had never been communicated to families.
In particular, there was the story of a retired policeman with suicidal thoughts who killed himself after being left unattended in a hallway for more than 14 hours.
Faced with these disturbing revelations, the Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, had asked for an independent investigation to be launched.
However, many problems were already known. A report by mediator Marie Boucher, filed last October, called the hospital’s emergency room a “ticking time bomb” for caregivers and patients. She had submitted a series of recommendations to management.
A temporary building
To improve staff conditions and respond to the obsolescence of emergencies, a modular building will temporarily accommodate emergencies next November, the CIUSSS de l’Ouest-de-l’Île-de-Montréal announced Thursday.
“The emergency was built in the 80s. It is a square block with examination rooms and fields of view that are not ideal,” said Dan Gabay, president and CEO of the CIUSSS.
This new building will provide the population and employees with “an emergency that meets standards and additional stretchers,” the CIUSSS said in a press release. This temporary establishment will also house the university family medicine group which will make it possible to redirect emergency patients classified in the priority scale among the least serious cases (levels 4 and 5).
“Puff in the Eyes”
Several union members showed up at the press conference, sign in hand, to put forward their point of view. “It’s window dressing,” said Johanne Riendeau, president of the Union of Health Care Professionals of the West Island of Montreal.
PHOTO ROBERT SKINNER, THE PRESS
Several union members from the Lakeshore General Hospital showed up at the press conference to put forward their point of view on Thursday.
She deplores the fact that the reports and their recommendations are accumulating without having any concrete effect on the situation of the employees. “There are 135 recommendations in the report. In the report of an expert that we had in October 2022, there were 14 recommendations and the employer is slow to apply them, ”she adds.
“We want to believe in this report, but it is difficult to believe it, especially when it says that there will be a technological shift and the digitization of files. Currently, there are only CLSCs and two departments at the LaSalle hospital where files are digitized,” added the local president of the Quebec Union of Service Employees, Maryse Valiquette.
Emergency workers held a sit in last weekend. “There is a crying shortage of nurses in the Lakeshore emergency room. Six out of 13 nurses were short on Sunday, Ms.me Riendeau. It’s hard to run an emergency when he lacks expertise. »