Editorial

It takes a team

Like so many pieces of well-oiled machinery.
When ‘Smoky the Bear’s alter ego’ climbed the power pole along the Mitsue Industrial Park road last week, sparking what could have been a multi-company-crumbling blaze, perhaps it was divine intervention that made all the pieces fit so perfectly together and arrest its progress. And while we do not doubt that a superior being played a hand in the outcome, neither would we down-play the importance of each company, every agency and individual that played a role in protecting the park and its many businesses.
When Chevron Texacao’s Doug Maurice saw ‘Smoky’ -- in his words -- ‘fry’ he responded immediately. When Weyerhaeuser’s Trina Torgerson saw the lines ‘explode’, she quickly alerted that company’s ‘initial attack’ crew, and raised the alarm with Slave Lake’s forest protection service. That arm of the Sustainable Resource Development department sent its own highly trained initial attack crews, and dispatched the air tankers – from Slave Lake and Lac La Biche to stifle the fire’s progress.
Hit it hard, hit it strong.
Within a couple of hours, the ‘air show’ was over. The helicopters with buckets moved in to douse the hot spots, ground crews began the digging, and the dozers began the arduous task of knocking down trees and scribing a fire break around the fire’s perimeter.
Like so many pieces of well-oiled machinery working as a unit.
That’s precisely the picture that anyone who needs medical assistance would experience if they were brought to the emergency department of the Slave Lake health complex.
So many hard-working individuals working separately —- yet together as a unit. Like so many pieces of well-oiled machinery.
Each cog in that giant wheel fits perfectly and performs its function with ease – and a whole lot of caring and dedication.
Remove one piece of that machine, and the smooth flow becomes noticeably staccato. Add a green or rusty part, and the process, while still effective, takes that little bit longer to complete. That’s precisely what the Provincial Health Authorities Association (PHAA) the health care ‘employer’ is attempting to do in its negotiations with the United Nurses of Alberta. It wants to re-assign nurses at will – ostensibly anywhere in the region (which in the case of Region 8, extends all the way from Jasper in the west to Cold Lake in the east).
A mediator – appointed by the ‘province’ when talks broke down three months into discussion – says employer should only be able to re-assign nurses within 50 kilometres of their current work site.
Unless, that is, there’s an ‘emergency’ situation that presents itself and the local health authority has no other options but to order that nurse to travel.
The mediator’s report is rather vague, doesn’t offer a definition of ‘emergency’, and doesn’t specify who’d pick up the tab for travel and other expenses when the RN is shuttled off ‘where ever’.
And what of the well-oiled piece of machinery?
Perhaps there’s an emergency that makes sending a nurse from Slave Lake to Cold Lake for a few shifts necessary. But how long can that ‘well-oiled piece of machinery’ in Slave Lake function at optimum levels with that certain nurse missing?
In the words of Bev Dick, the vice president of the United Nurses of Alberta, “they’d be robbing Peter to pay Paul.”
And what of Peter’s well-oiled piece of machinery? Perhaps we should ask PHAA – or Wellness Minister Gary Mar, or Premier Ralph Klein.
How many pieces of that well-oiled piece of machinery can we do without before the whole system begins to break down?