Study shows turnover rate remains high; nurse to patient ratio places both groups at risk

A nursing union has opened fire on the Hospital Authority by launching a three-day campaign calling for relief from the overburdening workload.

The Association of Hong Kong Nursing Staff urges its 24,000 members to wear stickers from April 20-22 to express their disapproval of the working conditions at 41 public hospitals.

In an advertisement posted in various newspapers Wednesday, the union blasts the authority's incapacity for retaining senior nurses.

"The union activity is trying to channel our staff's emotions to get rid of their frustration, anger or even depression toward the Hospital Authority, which has not seriously tackled the problems of nursing, especially in public hospitals," explained the union's Chairman Joseph Lee.

The union warned that the shortage of staff, especially of experienced nurses, may affect the quality of service in public hospitals.

The Hospital Authority responded to the nursing union's concern on its website Wednesday night, highlighting an earmark of additional HK$200 million in 2011-12 to strengthen the recruitment and retaining of nursing manpower.

The authority said it will create additional promotion posts, including over 50 nurse consultant and 150 advanced practice nurse posts, together with other training and development measures.

Hong Kong has experienced an acute shortage of nurses in recent years.

According to the Food and Health Bureau, 2,231 nurses in public hospitals resigned between April 2007 and November 2009. The turnover rate has been steady at over 4 percent every year.

Lee added that a recent survey by the association indicated that with the nurse-to-patient ratio at a maximum high, both patients and nurses in public hospitals are at risk.

Sylvia Fung, the authority' chief manager of nursing, emphasized that manpower increase is the first step but it takes time for the new policy to reap benefits.

"I understand the hardship of our frontline nurses. But since the policy has been newly introduced, we don't expect to see the results straightaway," Fung said.

The authority had earlier announced additional recruitment of 1,600 nurses in this financial year as well as an initiative to implement a mentorship policy for new staff to combat the shortage.

Union Chairman Lee however criticized the authority for pouring out resources to hire new nurses but doing nothing to retain those already employed.

"Lots of measures can be done to keep the experienced staff such as increasing their salary according to their performance after a year of experience," said Lee.

He added the authority has yet to open hundreds of positions for nurse officers it promised.

Concurring with Lee's opinion, Diana Lee, director of the School of Nursing at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, questioned the means by which the authority came up with 1,600 nurses.

She said offering extra money is not useful for keeping experienced nurses whose expectations are greater than salary.

"The nurses are disappointed because they feel that their views are not heard by the management. They have been asking for solutions to relieve work stress, increase job training and create senior nurses positions in the last decade, but none of problems has been addressed," Professor Lee said.

A nurse who is now working of Ruttonjee Hospital said on Wednesday that many senior nurses in her hospital have left to take positions in private hospitals because of better remuneration and working environment.

"As a result of manpower shortage, it is common for us to work nearly 60 hours a week without overtime payment," she said.

She stressed that even though nurses work under great pressure, they will not go on strike because of their responsibility to maintain a high quality of service to the public.

China Daily

(HK Edition 04/21/2011 page1)