N.S. nurse shortage causes huge overtime bills
Last Updated: Monday, November 2, 2009 | 7:20 PM AT
CBC News
Nova Scotia's nurse shortage has resulted in huge overtime payments to some workers — as much as $145,700 in one case.
The top OT earner, whose normal salary is $69,000 a year, is a nurse with the Capital District Health Authority, according to documents obtained by CBC News through a freedom of information request.
The nurse tripled her salary last year by working 2,215 hours overtime hours — at double pay.
The health district didn't release any information about where the nurse works or what she does.
"All I can say is that no one has any problems with the quality of her work," said Susan Jakeman, the district's privacy officer.
A second nurse raked in $134,098 in overtime pay, the documents show.
In fact, the top 100 nurses — excluding the top two — all worked more than 200 overtime hours each during the past year, partly because the health district is short 52 nurses, mostly in specialties like emergency.
Kathy MacNeil, the CDHA's vice-president of people, said no patients are suffering.
"We look at things like infection rates, medication error rates, patient complaints, and the manager is always aware of the hours that her employees work," said MacNeil. "So it's not that somebody works all of these hours and nobody knows. There are a number of checks and balances."
Officials are trying to fix the overtime problem by creating more spaces in nursing school, as well as using others to do work that doesn't require a nursing degree.
They're also trying to cut down on sick time.
Though the top OT earner wasn't off sick at all, there are a number of nurses on the list who logged more than 100 hours of sick time per year.
Michael Rachlis, a health policy analyst, said nurses have the highest absentee rate of any profession in the country. He said 7,000 nurses don't show up for work every day, which is more than graduate from nursing school every year.
"Health-care workplaces are very demanding of their staff, tend to wear them out. And as they get worn out, they are too tired to come to work the next day, forcing their colleagues to stay late. And before you know it you can have a very evil transition in a workplace where everybody is working lots of overtime," said Rachlis.
"It can really be a vicious circle where things get worse and worse and worse."
MacNeil said the district is working on the overtime problem, but it could take five to 10 years to sort it out.
