General News
22 June, 2023
“There just aren’t enough”
SUNNYSIDE House Aged Hostel is among multiple regional and rural aged care facilities concerned by the approaching deadline for a 24/7 registered nurse.
SUNNYSIDE House Aged Hostel is among multiple regional and rural aged care facilities concerned by the approaching deadline for a 24/7 registered nurse.
The Federal Government introduced the mandate of have a registered nurse onsite 24/7 after the federal election in May last year, with a deadline set for July 1.
Acting CEO Bec Siemon said the facility has advertised for registered nurses on their website and Facebook page, with a permanent ad placed on Seek’s website.
“We’ve tried as much as possible to get word of mouth out there, and if we do use agency registered nurses we’ve tried to recruit them to work for us rather than agency,” she said.
“A lot of regional and rural facilities are in the same boat as us in that there just aren’t enough registered nurses in rural areas to go around.
“We all have a bit of a hybrid model; we have both registered nurses and enrolled nurses, so there is always a nurse either on call or at the facility at all times.
“We put that to the department that this sort of model will continue to suit us because of the lack of registered nursed that are available, and we do have senior enrolled nurses as well as registered nurses on call 24/7.”
According to Ms Siemon, the Department of Health and Aged Care has taken the facilities statement to be discussed by members of parliament.
“They’ve understood that this is the only way, without relying on agency which we also find difficult to get out here,” she said.
“Relying on permanent agency staff would be a massive financial drain.
“We hope they will accept the enrolled nursing hybrid, where we have enrolled nurses as well as registered nurses, until such time as we recruit more registered nurses as well.
“Our hybrid model means that enrolled nurses would not lose out on their job if we did recruit more registered nurses, it would just mean we would just have extra nurses.”
Sunnyside House chairman Philip Downie said there was a general lack of nurses in regional areas, and accommodation is another key issue in employing registered nurses.
“If you get a nurse who wants to come rural, it’s often not possible because they can’t find accommodation,” he said.
“Agency staff are far more expensive than having a registered nurse employed by us, if you can get them to come.
“A lot of them don’t want to come to the country, so you can’t get agency staff more often than not.
“I think the government has jumped the gun a little bit on bringing in the requirement to have nurses 24/7 a year earlier than they were going to, and it’d going to put enormous pressure on small rural facilities.”
Mr Downie said it was unfortunate that the government does not appear to recognize the abilities of enrolled nurses in aged care.
“Eventually, given the model they’re going for, I don’t know what the place is for enrolled nurses in aged care anymore, so that’s a difficult one for everybody concerned,” he said.
“Hopefully we can get some sense from the government to recognize enrolled nurses pretty well down the track of having the abilities that are required.”
Ms Seimon said residents of Sunnyside House would not be affected at all by the situation.
“It would impact the facility more financially, in terms that agency nurses can cost the facility upwards of $200 an hour, and that doesn’t include accommodation. That accumulates really quickly,” she said.
“It’ll impact us financially if we have to rely on agency nurses long-term. They’re always great if we have another nurse, be it enrolled or registered, on sick leave or annual leave or on holidays or maternity leave, they’re a great backstop.
“They’re not something any facility should be putting into their plan as a long-term solution, and unfortunately there’s no other choice at the moment.
“We do have a really great team of nurses here, and we’re really trying hard to recruit some more; if there are any nurses out there that would like to come and join our team, we would be really interested in hearing from them.”
