The sole director of the company that manages the Cavarzano RSA is alarmed. Paolo Santesso: “Without a personal standard farewell, even the Oss are at risk”
BELLUNO. Directors and presidents have repeated this for many months, sounding the alarm for what could soon happen. Eventually the fears became a reality. And today, in the middle of the third wave of Coronavirus, the shortage of nurses, in addition to affecting the assistance service reserved for the elderly, risks reducing the number of beds within the various structures.
Without a certain number of nurses, in fact, the nursing homes would go beyond the standards imposed by the Region. And that’s not all: in the event of a reduction in beds, in fact, social health workers will also have to be reduced.
The first alarm was launched by Sersa’s sole administrator, Paolo Santesso, who runs the retirement home in Belluno. “From March 15 to April 15, many nurses who won the Ulss 1 Dolomiti competition in December will begin to leave,” says Santesso.
The healthcare company, as most will remember, at the end of 2020, had promised that it would wait some time before hiring the winning professionals of the tender, following the desperate cry of directors and presidents of the service centers who, at the end of the last year, they were grappling with the boom in infections among their guests and operators. Now, however, Ulss 1 has decided to proceed, thus putting the Belluno rsa to the brink.
“The situation on the nurses front is difficult,” Santesso continues. “We have 120 beds out of 150 occupied. We are under full occupancy, but seven more nurses will leave between now and April 15. In the spring, we will find ourselves with only seven nurses. This means that we will no longer be able to guarantee the standards that the Region imposes on us ».
Sersa has been moving for months to recruit more nursing staff, but to date without success. The company had also decided to look beyond national borders, turning its spotlight on Eastern Europe.
“We contacted the world of freelancers and retirees, thinking of creating a new team to cover only the nights,” says the sole administrator. «We had also succeeded, but even before activating this group there was a defection and nothing more was done. We had also searched the foreign market, but the broker’s modalities were not suitable ».
So what to do? “If for the first period we can make up for the shortage of nurses by assigning to the wards also the professionals who now perform the function of coordinators”, Paolo Santesso anticipates, “if something does not happen, in the following months we will be forced to reduce the number of beds to stay within the parameters imposed by regional standards. And this means that some elderly people will have to be moved to another facility ».
At the Gaggia Lante, therefore, there will be redundant guests, as will some social health workers.
“Unfortunately, no response has been received from the Region regarding the start of courses for specialized health workers, as we had requested. If we can’t find staff, the future for our SSA will be difficult. And all this, in a short time, will also cascade into all the other structures ».