By Greg Nikkel
The Sun Country Health Region is coming off a fairly positive year in 2015, and they are looking forward to the new year, including more progress on the new acute-care hospital for Weyburn.
CEO Marga Cugnet said the region is in good shape for doctors, nurses and other medical staff, and are in the midst of preparing new services for the residents of Sun Country, including CAT Scans at Estevan’s hospital, ultrasounds in Weyburn and Estevan, and cataract surgeries at the Weyburn General Hospital.
“We are extending ultrasound services to four days a week in Weyburn, and five days a week in Estevan,” said Cugnet, noting they were able train a local technician for both sites, with a Yellow Grass resident to take care of the ultrasounds at the Weyburn hospital.
She added the plans for the CT scans at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Estevan may be able to start up by mid-January, with equipment and training all in place. This service will be available for all Sun Country patients, which should help reduce waiting times and accessibility to get the scans, which previously had to be arranged for in Regina.
“For Weyburn, we’re just formalizing the details for the cataract program. We’re ordering the last of the equipment and are getting the staff trained,” said Cugnet, noting that once the equipment is in place, the ophthalmologist will come from Regina to do cataract surgeries in the Weyburn hospital, which again will help reduce waiting times for this procedure.
The equipment will include a laser for cutting of the cataract from the eye, and an operating microscope, along with other smaller pieces, which is fairly expensive, said Cugnet.
“We did get some funding from the ministry, plus we had designated funding for equipment for Weyburn General Hospital, which was actually in place before the Hospital Foundation was formed,” she said.
The new facility in Radville has been working well this year, said the CEO, noting the long-term care residents are enjoying it, and the community is very appreciative to have it.
In addition, the demolition of the old Marian Health Centre is now complete, and the site is restored. The property owner is the Catholic health organization which owns both the Radville facility and St. Joseph’s Hospital in Estevan.
Asked about staffing for Sun Country, Cugnet said there are some challenges, but the health region is in better shape than it has been in the past.
“We still have challenges with recruiting nurses, particularly with smaller rural facilities. It’s great that we have a lot of younger staff, but we have challenges replacing them when they take maternity leaves,” said Cugnet.
In regards to physicians, Sun Country is working to maintain a healthy number, in spite of challenges such as three physicians leaving at the end of December or early January from the Primary Care Clinic in downtown Weyburn.
Cugnet explained the three are all leaving for different reasons, but largely they are family-related situations.
One new doctor, Dr. Grosenick, is already in place, with Dr. Ebenezer set to come in mid-January from the SIPPA program, and local graduate Dr. Jared Oberkirsch set to come by September, after he graduates in May.
In addition, said Cugnet, the health region is in negotiations with a husband-and-wife team here in Saskatchewan, with the hopes that, if the talks work out, they can come and be in practice by March.
“I think we’ve had a pretty good year in long-term care,” said Cugnet, noting she completed a tour of all facilities, and for the most part residents are very happy with the care they are receiving.
“The staff are very dedicated to make a home for the residents,” she noted.
One of the issues they were able to address was to add recreation activities on the weekends, and the residents have indicated they are very happy with this.
An interesting development this year has been a large increase in the resumes submitted to Sun Country for positions that were previously hard to fill, such as for maintenance and trade positions, she said.
Sun Country has also been involved with planning at the provincial level for the coming influx of Syrian refugee families, said the CEO, although at this point there aren’t any families designated yet for the Sun Country area.
“We’re going to continue to have challenges with the budget,” said Cugnet, noting the province has indicated challenges in the economy with reduced revenues, and the health region is setting out next year’s budget with salary and capital costs, with ongoing maintenance and repairs to the region’s 28 health care facilities.
Collective agreements are in place with two of the health region’s unions, with talks ongoing with the Saskatchewan Union of Nurses.
One capital project is finishing the sprinkler system for the long-term care facility in Carnduff, the last such facility to have new fire sprinklers installed.
“That was a top priority for the board and for the ministry,” said Cugnet.
