Today a few dozen nurses bum-rushed the office of CEO in the Ministry of Health, Dr Peter Allen demanding answers. They wanted answers just like their colleague Dianne Pascascio did when she confronted Allen in his office last week.
And while they demanded the meeting in the heat and height of a rage over administrative indifference, the always-smooth Dr. Allen seemed to have clamed them down with a spoonful of sugar: he agreed to put 14 nurses into the training programme at the University of Belize; the same programme that Nurse Pascascio wanted to get into - except this 14 does not include Nurse Pascascio.
He explained to PLUS TV this evening why it took so long to settle the matter:
Dr. Peter Allen - CEO, Ministry of Health
"Well, we are always in agreement with our nursing staff. Let me tell you what the challenge was. For several years, we found that our nurses have been under-staffed, and especially in the specialized nursing areas. So, we've been working on designing a course for operating room technicians. I think many people would know that my scrub nurses in the operating rooms, and for nurse anesthetists who help out with the medical gases in the operating rooms, we've been working the University of Belize to provide these courses, and hopefully, we'll be able to provide them on an ongoing basis. They cost of providing these courses at UB has come to bit under 1 million dollars, but with the help of the Ministry of Finance, and with the support of our nurses, we've been able to get those funds deposited to UB, and arranged the courses. Now, the course are scheduled to have started on Monday, but what we realized was that there were a few challenges that hadn't been fully dealt with yet, but the principle one is that when we take 40 nurses out of the system, bear in mind that we are already short of nurses throughout the country, it places quite a strain on the services that we offer. And we hadn't yet been able to recruit a replacement 40 nurses."
Allen says they have identified enough replacements for 14 nurses - which will cost about a half a million dollars. The replacement nurses will be hired on contract.
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