Vitalité using travel nurses to address staffing shortages in Campbellton ER

Vitalité Health Network is making use of travel nurses to fill ER vacancies at the Campbellton Regional Hospital, and it made the decision without the province's backing. In an email statement sent Friday, the network said its priority is to ensure the continuity of care in the Campbellton Emergency Department. It said it needs support from other nurses while new hires are trained there. It continued to say this support includes the use of agency nurses who would be needed for several more weeks. They've confirmed there is two travel nurses in Campbellton as we speak. And there is another one on its way. They did this on their own, and the government had no knowledge of it either. The province has said in the past it wants to move away from the costly use of travel nurses and that Vitality should focus on recruiting local nurses instead. But in this case, it says it's trusting Vitality's ability to manage the staffing shortage. Nothing's forbidden. We do not like if someone is using them. We have given direction to keep the ER open. We've given direction to put primary care people, nurse practitioners, back into primary care. That's what we've done. We try not to micromanage. At the end of the day, Vitalité manages our ER and our primary care clinics. And so generally, from our experiences in the past, we like to be aware if travel nurses are being used. I am not aware of the management plan for Campbellton at this point in time. The PC health critic thinks the province needs to offer more staffing support to Vitalité if it doesn't want travel nurses used. I don't think travel nurses are the best choice. They're very expensive, but what other options have they given her? The recruitment that they talk about clearly doesn't take into account northern New Brunswick. The province recently ordered Vitalité to send nurses it had pulled from primary care to fill ER vacancies back to their clinics. At the time, Vitalité told CBC News it still needed the support of those nurses to keep the ER open. We asked Vitalité for more information about how much the use of travel nurses would cost, but we haven't heard back. Mann says based on conversations he's had with Vitalité in the past, travel nurses are paid around $125 an hour and their lodging is paid for. At the end of the day, we have to keep the ER open. So if this is the only way they can do it, I'm happy that the ER is open. We have to be concerned about our 32,000 citizens that we have to take care of in Rusticush. CBC News asked the network for more details about how long the nurses would be asked to work in the ER but we didn't get a response.