Deadlock over nursing aides continues

Industrial action in state hospitals, homes for the elderly and health centres continued yesterday as the deadlock between Government and the General Workers Union remained unresolved.

Union section secretary Louis Marsh has admitted that the directives to nursing aides, health assistants and care workers are having a negative effect on patients and other workers, but added that "the government drove us to it".

Since Friday, the employees working in hospitals and homes for the elderly were ordered to only do food-related jobs, including handing out breakfast, tea and coffee.

They usually help out nurses in the washing and changing of patients and help them get out of bed.

Although the work was still being done, this has put an extra burden on other health workers, especially nurses.

On Friday, the health authorities appealed to relatives of bedridden patients to lend a helping hand.

At St Vincent de Paul Residence - probably the most affected because of the number of bedridden patients - nurses were going beyond their call of duty and doing the work on their own.

Moreover, residence superintendent Ronald Fiorentino said, nursing aides, health assistants and care workers working overtime did all their chores.

The union had originally ordered the directives to be respected even during overtime. It had even threatened to boycott strike-breakers.

When contacted, Mr Marsh initially said Health Minister Louis Deguara had given the wrong impression that directives were adversely affecting patients. He later acknowledged that the directives were indeed having an effect.

"It is not that the directives are not having an effect, I do not want to beat about the bush. But not to the extent mentioned by the minister."

The work, he said, was still being done, although it was taking longer.

Would this not lead to suffering for patients, including the possibility of bed sores if they were left in the same position for a long time?

Mr Marsh said patients were being moved. He accused the government of having driven the union to industrial action, adding that had negotiations persevered, an acceptable solution would have been found.

Mr Marsh was asked whether the GWU deemed it fair to order actions that put a bigger burden on other workers.

The union, he replied, did not believe it should let people suffer, but it had no other option but to resort to industrial action.

Mr Marsh said he had told the Office of the Prime Minister in an e-mail that the union was still open to talks.

Contacted yesterday, Malta Union of Midwives and Nurses president Paul Pace said nurses had been asked to prioritise their work.

"Where it is humanly possible, they should do the work and do their utmost to try and minimise inconvenience to patients."

Nurses had to resort to a rotation basis to get bedridden patients out of bed. It was also taking them some two to three hours more to wash patients.

Mr Pace described as positive the government's call on family members to give a helping hand.

When a similar directive was ordered last month, relatives had vented their anger on the nurses when they found their loved ones still in bed.

"This time round, the people know it is not the nurses' fault," he said.

The directives also called for nursing aides, care workers and health assistants working at St Luke's Hospital's outpatient department and health centres not to process medical files or X-rays, while health centre employees are also not taking appointments.

Sir Paul Boffa Hospital superintendent Noel Fenech said the hospital had been affected but was coping because nurses were doing the work themselves.

St Luke's Hospital superintendent Frank Bartolo said things ran smoothly yesterday, pointing out that only a small percentage of the hospital's patients are bedridden.

The union ordered directives because of three issues - nursing aides' right for wage scale 13, the roster, and a premium allowance for the three categories of workers.