Debbie Forward said several nurses at the Health Sciences Centre emergency room are desperate to find new assignments. (CBC)

The largest hospital in Newfoundland and Labrador is trying to cope with nurses who want to leave their jobs, citing excessive workloads and stress.

"A lot of our nurses that are working in that department — our senior nurses, very experienced — are saying, 'Enough, I need to get out of here,' " said Debbie Forward, president of the Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses' Union.

The nurses are assigned to the emergency department at the Health Sciences Centre in St. John's.

Forward said the nurses are in a bind because managers cannot recruit suitable replacements.

"They have at least eight nurses, senior nurses, in that department at the Health Sciences who have been awarded positions elsewhere ... but they haven't been able to be released from emergency because there is no one experienced to replace them."

The union is speaking out on the heels of revelations by the Newfoundland and Labrador Medical Association, which said last week that patient waits in ERs across the province are excessive.

Eastern Health manager Pat Coish-Snow said the authority is trying to alleviate stressful workloads in the ER. (CBC)

The NLMA, which is in a bargaining stalemate with Treasury Board, says a lack of family doctors is forcing many patients to head to ERs for their primary care. As well, the physicians say poor working conditions and pay make it difficult to find doctors willing to work in emergency medicine.

Forward said many ER nurses are burning out and are desperate to find less stressful work.

Meetings are ongoing with nurses and their union to try to fix the problem.

Pat Coish-Snow, manager of acute care with Eastern Health, said the regional authority is trying to find solutions.

"I mean, nurses have certainly indicated to us their concerns about working in our emergency department," she said.

Coish-Snow said a recent study looked at ways of improving the flow of patients through emergency departments, such as quicker admission procedures and ways to relieve the bottleneck of patients who need to be transferred to other departments.

"You have to look at the picture as a whole and I think we have to make sure that nurses know we are committed to working with them."

Health Minister Jerome Kennedy said the problem of relying on ERs for primary care is not unique to Newfoundland and Labrador.

"The latest statistics from across the country indicate that in Newfoundland and Labrador we're spending the most money per capita in the country," he said.

"So now what we have to look at, or what my role as minister is, to determine: Are we using that money as efficiently and effectively as possible?"