Frontline continuing care assistants (CCAs) are sounding the alarm over unsafe staffing levels, inadequate time to care for patients, and worsening working conditions in Saskatchewan’s health care system. CUPE 5430’s CCA committee’s new research report, Checking the Pulse of CCAs, highlights the growing challenges CCAs face in workplaces across the province.
The research report surveyed 1,290 continuing care assistants and found:
- 76% of respondents said they do not have safe staffing levels.
- 68% of home care workers said they do not have enough time to travel between clients.
- 74% said they do not have enough time to provide adequate patient care.
- 73% said they would not recommend that friends or family members become a CCA.
“These findings should concern every person in Saskatchewan who relies on our health care system. Whether that is accessing health centres and hospitals, utilizing home care services, or having a loved one in long-term care, CCAs do it all,” said Laura Guilbault, chair of CUPE 5430’s CCA committee. “We are the backbone of Saskatchewan’s health system but we’re not being treated like it.”
“Our members have not had a wage increase in 4.5 years, and our CCA members make significantly less than their counterparts across Canada,” said Bashir Jalloh, president of CUPE 5430. “If this government doesn’t address these issues, they will continue to lose hardworking CCAs who run our health system day in, day out.”
The CCA committee is calling for measures to address short-staffing, low wages and the lack of a contract. The report also recommends that the Saskatchewan Health Authority to take immediate action on the following items:
- The lack of travel time in community care does not allow CCAs to get from one patient to the next and affects both workload and patient satisfaction.
- An in-depth review of the provincial job description to standardize what CCAs are doing across the province.
- Return CCAs to acute settings: this will free up LPNs and RNs to provide in-depth patient care and significantly increase patient satisfaction by improving the timely response to personal care needs and requests and improving staff morale for nursing staff who are often overwhelmed and understaffed.
