Budget pressures at St. Joseph's Health Care have lead to cutbacks.
The hospital is eliminating 60 positions - 49 full-time, seven part-time, and four casual - as it deals with a $5.9-million deficit.
Many of the job losses were achieved through attrition and early retirements, cutting the number of layoff notices handed out Wednesday to 12.
Dr. Gillian Kernaghan, President and CEO of St. Joseph’s Health Care, says 12 temporarily funded transitional care beds are also being axed in October.
"Those beds were used for people who were transitioning from acute care," says Kernaghan. "We will be able to keep three beds that had permanent funding and we will be looking at the other beds that we have at Parkwood Institute main building, our complex care beds we call them and looking at how we might be able to transition the use of those beds to support that population as we go forward."
The cuts are blamed on changes to the provincial funding model and a lack of provincial funding increases.
"Over the past four years we have had 0% increases to cover inflation. Just like at home the cost of hydro and heat is going up," says Kernaghan. "We have had no increase in our funding to meet those inflationary pressures and that has translated into about $7-million every year for the last four years and going into next year."
Kernaghan says under the provincial funding formula hospital funding has been reduced by $8.5-million.
The hospital's Board of Directors approved the budget plan for the 2016/17 fiscal year to address the almost $17 million gap in operations on a total annual operating budget of $424-million.
"Hospitals are allowed to carry a deficit if they have a way to fund a deficit," says Kernaghan. "We fortunately have funds in the bank, just like you would have a savings account, that we can cover that deficit going into next year. You can't do that year over year but we made a strategic decision that we would, with the support of the board, carry about a $6-million deficit so we don't have to make additional cuts while we look and work collaboratively with the Ministry around the funding formula and what that looks like for the organization."
Kernaghan says patient care will not suffer as a result of the cuts.
"I would like to reassure the public that they have both staff and physicians who are very committed to quality care and with the budget pressures we are facing next year we will maintain our funded inpatient and outpatient volumes."
