Nursing dept thankful for upgraded space at St Ann’s Bay Regional Hospital
DIRECTOR OF Nursing Services (DNS) at St Ann’s Bay Regional Hospital Carmen Johnson and her team have expressed delight in the refurbished and enlarged space they now occupy at the health facility.
Since February, Johnson and several nurse managers have been relocated to an upgraded space next to the social work department at the hospital, after years of operating from cramped spaces.
Johnson said the space previously occupied was inadequate from which to serve the nurses at the i nstitution who make up 49 per cent of the workforce at the institution.
The new space consists of two offices, a kitchenette, an area to seat four sets of people, with each department and nursing manager now having their own space.
“Nursing together is all in one location so we can complement and seek to support and collaborate with the work that we all do,” Johnson told The Gleaner.
“Our hope is that it will help to energise the nursing department, not just those of us who work in the space, but the other staff members, the patient care assistants, the psychiatric nursing aids, the enrolled assistant nurses, registered nurses, and registered midwives that they too will recognise that there is a space for them.”
The deputy DNS, Anastasia Rose, also welcomed the new space.
“It is a breath of fresh air. I’ve been here 25 years and I’ve been waiting on this moment, it’s now here and I’m so elated about it. I am happy,” Rose said.
Department Nurse Manager Michelle Hall and acting department nurse manager Murlene Campbell-Taylor also expressed satisfaction with the new location.
Meanwhile, the chief executive officer at the St Ann’s Bay Regional Hospital, Dennis Morgan, said the new space for the nursing managers means enhanced productivity and to some extent, a level of comfort for the staff.
“And for me it’s a way of showing our staff and in particular this critical group of nurses that management is listening and that we value them,” Morgan said.
“Things may not happen as quickly as they would want or like, nonetheless it will happen in terms of the change, in terms of their working environment; and this is just the start of a number of infrastructure initiatives being undertaken by the regional health authority to not just enhance the clinical areas of the patients, but also for staff, as well in terms of their working environment and comfort.”