Ontario Hospital Calls Claims About Kitchen Staff Helping Nurses 'False' & 'Dangerous'

An Ontario hospital is firing back after a union representing more than 60,000 health care workers made claims that kitchen staff had been called in to help during the province's ongoing nursing shortage.

According to the SEIU Healthcare union, "dietary aides" (kitchen workers who prep meals for hospital patients) were asked to team up with registered practical nurses at a hospital in Orangeville due to staffing shortages.

However, the president and CEO of Headwaters Health Care Centre, Kim Delahunt, called the claim "false" and "dangerous," and accused the union of spreading "blatant misinformation."

"We are very disappointed that SEIU has created a false narrative at the expense of the hospital and our hard-working staff, who have given everything they have over the past 22 months in the service of their community," Delahunt wrote in a January 24 statement.

Delahunt said at least one patient expressed concerns about being brought by ambulance to Headwaters' emergency room because they "didn't want to be cared for by kitchen staff."

"To be clear: Only trained health care professionals provide patient care at Headwaters Health Care Centre, regardless of external or internal circumstances. Some non-clinical staff may perform duties outside of their usual scope of work occasionally when necessary but rest assured that these do not include caring for patients," Delahunt said.

SEIU Healthcare President Sharleen Stewart told Narcity that while she agrees that staffing challenges are a provincewide issue, some of Delahunt's statements are untrue.

"The documents that she sent out to the staff on Friday [were] saying, you know, 'Because of the staffing shortage, can some of you please offer the work over the weekend?'" Stewart said and added that while she can understand what Delahunt is trying to say about Headwaters' reputation being affected, Stewart is more concerned about the health services being provided to the public.

"I make no apologies for that," she said.

According to Stewart, nurses from Headwaters contacted the union to express concerns that dietary aides were being asked to come on the floor to help with "call bells," which is what patients use to call a staff member for assistance with anything from using the bathroom to getting a drink.

"Their exact words to me were, 'Look, we appreciate the helping hands, but they have to be the right hands. Meaning we have a nursing crisis; nobody's dealing with it. Sending in non-nursing staff is not going to make my job any easier because they are limited to what they can do,'" Stewart shared.

"In no way did I ever say [the dietary aides] were doing the nursing work," Stewart clarified. She emphasized that the nurses' concern, rather, was that their presence was "more work than help."

Staffing challenges are not uncommon for Ontario hospitals as of late. Earlier this month, William Osler Health System, which oversees Brampton Civic Hospital and Etobicoke General Hospital, declared a "Code Orange" because of an increase of COVID-19 patients in combination with staffing challenges that impacted the hospital's capacity.

Ontario also reinstated Directive 2 on January 5, instructing hospitals to "pause all non-emergent and non-urgent surgeries and procedures in order to preserve critical care and human resource capacity," according to a press release.

Furthermore, the Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario recently called Ford's plan to move the province out of Step Two by the end of the month "premature," stating that reopening will "prolong the current health system crisis."

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.