While power changed hands at Queen’s Park in June of 2018, and a new Conservative government took the reins after 15 years of Liberal government, RNAO’s advocacy remains as passionate and as effective as ever.

That was evident at Queen’s Park Day on Feb. 21, when 160 RNs, NPs and nursing students visited the legislature to meet with more than 60 members of provincial parliament (MPP) from all parties whose leaders later spoke and answered questions.

The June 2018 election brought many new faces to an annual event that will celebrate two decades next year. Among them: Doug Downey, the Progressive Conservative MPP from Barrie-Springwater-Oro-Medonte, and parliamentary assistant to Finance Minister Vic Fedeli.

Downey’s mother was a nurse and he saw how hard she worked, he told RNAO assembly leaders Amanda Fountain, Cherie Durksen and Erika Fifield as the four talked of pressing needs in health care over breakfast.

Residents in long-term care (LTC), the nurses said, sometimes go to hospital and incur the risk of a transfer because lab services in LTC are often only offered a couple of days a week. “I’d like to be able to care for them at their (nursing) home,” said Fountain, president of RNAO’s South Simcoe Chapter.

There simply isn’t enough staffing to toilet residents regularly, an assault to their dignity and a trigger for aggressive behaviour that hurts patients, staff, and the bottom line, said Durksen, South Simcoe’s communications executive network officer (ENO).