Quinte Health Care counts their blessings as this difficult year comes to a close

By Maria Toews

BELLEVILLE – Despite the long and challenging past year, Quinte Health Care says the support of the community and  key partnerships played an enormous role in helping them through 2021.

This year has been exceptionally difficult for QHC, not only with COVID, but also with a higher than normal amount of people needing to be treated for non-COVID related issues.

“In the past year I think we have collectively reaffirmed a belief in commitment to and understanding of the importance of caring,” said Dr. Colin MacPherson. Photo via www.qhc.on.ca

“In addition to COVID, we are still seeing unprecedented demand for emergency and in-patient care and a care population that is sicker and complex,” said Quinte Health Care’s President and CEO Stacey Daub in a year-end news conference. 

Currently, QHC is operating at 200 medicine beds which is a 38% increase from when the pandemic started in March 2020. Furthermore, there has been a 21% increase in the beds they were operating from April to September. 

Because of this, the staff have been, and continue to, work longer hours and work under more stress.

“It hasn’t been easy to pull through time and again but during the past year the staff and the physicians have been very creative in finding ways to bolster each other, support each other, attend to each other’s needs, ensure that people can steal some time away here and there,” said Chief of Staff Dr. Colin MacPherson.

“In many cases and in different departments it hasn’t been easy. But it really has been a group effort. Not just to meet the demands of the care needs but also to support each other and maintain our wellness.”

This year QHC has hired more staff than in any other year with over 200 new employees since March of 2019.

“Each one of them has brought their own skills, commitment, dedication, and a really nice spirit. It’s good to have more numbers, particularly now; granted the demand has also grown as we’ve mentioned before,” Dr. MacPherson said.

Despite these challenges, QHC says the community support has been a huge encouragement.

“The biggest achievement to me in the last year is the fact that there isn’t a week that goes by that I don’t get a letter from our community expressing thanks for some remarkable care that they provided. And when I say remarkable I mean it could be the smallest things to the biggest things even in the midst of one of the most challenging times in our history,” said Daub.

“I’ve never been prouder than today thinking about this last year and just what an incredible team I’ve joined,” said Stacey Daub. Photo via https://www.qhc.on.ca/

She says the support from the community has been a huge encouragement and says she hopes people will continue to be understanding when coming to the hospital. 

“It’s also about being very kind to our teams when you visit Quinte Health Care. I still hear on a regular basis how challenging some of our community can be with heightened temperatures in our emergency department and other areas of the hospital,” Daub said.

“I implore every single person to bring their best self and kindest self to the hospital when you come. Not only to be kind but also to bring words of support and encouragement and patience.”

As Christmas is around the corner, Dr. MacPherson says the staff “are stepping up. They are responding to the challenge. They’re changing their Christmas plans; they’re changing their holiday plans; they’re putting in longer hours again.”

“We really came together well and that really epitomizes the spirit that we’ve all taken in time and again in the hospital. It’s been an amazing thing to be a part of, to see the commitment and dedication up front here within these walls with my colleagues and the staff,” he said as he reflected on this past year.

Not only has the community helped QHC but also partnerships. 

“We have really worked hard on our partnerships this past year and I think those partnerships are really going to enable us to think outside the walls of the hospital and to really create a different experience together,” Doub said. 

“Not only are we going to improve internally and have great plans but there is also a real opportunity for us to work more as one community which is really exciting.”

One example she gives is when the COVID cases went up earlier this year Emergency Medical Services (EMS)n and Loyalist College quickly stepped up to help at the testing centres. She also says that the partnership with Public Health, EMS and Loyalist College was key to helping bring vaccinations across the region.

“I think those partnerships are incredibly important. There is no one partner in the community who could do this alone, so working together has been exceptionally helpful,” she said.

“We are really looking for the support of our community to support everyone in healthcare. That includes being very kind to everyone in the community, to all the healthcare heroes who work here,” said Stacey Daub. Photo via www.qhc.on.ca

With the new variant of COVID hitting the region, Daub says that they will take what they have learned this past year and apply it to this new wave. 

“The way that I think about the upcoming next six weeks to two month is that it’s team QHC against team COVID and we are going to win. But the only way we are going to win is if we have our community at our backs every step of the way.”

In light of the new year fast approaching, QHC plans to continue working with their partners and calls on the community for support and understanding.

“I think this renewed sense of partnership across our communities and with our communities is so inspiring to the team at Quinte that we really plan to leverage those partnerships and work in partnership and in service in the new year.”