Louela Manakil-Rankin and Karey McCullough were recognized by RNAO at its 95th Annual General Meeting (celebrated virtually) for their tremendous leadership in nursing education and nursing research, respectively. Manakil-Rankin, who has worked in nursing education for 20 years and is currently an assistant professor at Nipissing University in North Bay, says she has a passion for undergraduate education, and credits her professional and personal values for her teaching approach. “I believe that a competent nurse is a thinking nurse. It is someone who can reason clinically and make a prudent judgment,” Manakil-Rankin says. McCullough also works as an associate professor at Nipissing University and recently completed research on Indigenous wellness in North Bay’s Anishinabek Nation community. Her passion for research came from her own curiosity and always being interested in how thinking is informed when it comes to best practices in nursing. For more information about other RNAO Recognition Award winners in 2020, read their biographies online. (BayToday.ca, June 18)

Angela Cooper Brathwaite, RNAO immediate past-president and co-chair of the association’s Anti-Black Racism Task Force, writes a letter to the Brampton Guardian (July 9) about systemic racism in Canada’s health-care system. The letter is in response to news that Leonard Rodriques, a PSW who passed away from COVID-19, was reluctant to seek medical help because he feared he would be treated differently because he was Black.

The litany of health-system failures that contributed to the death of Leonard Rodriques, and subjected his family to untold grief and loss, can only be understood as manifestations of a health-care system deeply rooted in systemic racism. That Mr. Rodriques was reluctant to seek medical help because he feared he would be treated differently because he was Black is telling in itself. The treatment Mr. Rodriques received must be a wake-up call, and RNAO is calling for a coroner’s investigation into his death. In Ontario, a coroner may become involved when concerns are raised regarding the care provided to an individual prior to death.

There are multiple questions that must be answered: Why wasn’t he provided with personal protective equipment (PPE) in his workplace when it was known other workers had been infected? Why was he discharged from hospital even though he was a health-care worker who worked at a facility experiencing an outbreak, and was obviously suffering from symptoms? Why didn’t an ambulance show up when the family called 911? Why was the family left to deal with his body in such a disgraceful way after he died in his sleep at home? Why was he cremated against his family’s wishes?

As nurses, we send our deepest condolences to his wife Dorothy, to whom he was married for 33 years, and to his children Terena and Temall. We also thank them for the courage to speak out. We know of others who have had similar experiences, and fear speaking out.
Racism permeates every aspect of our society and its institutions, including health care. Combatting it requires substantive and sustained efforts to ensure structural and behavioural changes. Answering vital questions about the death of Mr. Rodriques is a good starting point. Calling a coroner’s inquest into his death is the first step.

RNAO is also doing its part, committed to cleaning up our own backyard within the nursing profession. This is why we are launching a task force to tackle anti-Black racism within the profession.

To show their support for nurses and other frontline workers fighting COVID-19, people from Ontario and across Canada are cheering them on every night at 7:30 p.m. local time. As part of the #TogetherWeCanDoIt campaign to #Cheer4HealthWorkers – spearheaded by RNAO’s Susan McNeil, staff, board, assembly and general members – and by now – the public at large – people are sharing videos on Twitter and Facebook of themselves banging pots and pans, singing, honking and clapping from their places of isolation, whether a front porch, deck, a balcony or through a window. RNAO’s Region 4 board representative Anita Tsang-Sit banged a pot while commending nursing colleagues and other health-care professionals during the outbreak. “Thank you to health-care superheroes who risk their lives for us every day,” she said in her Twitter video. RNAO Interest Groups representative Julie Rubel also participated, saying in her Twitter video: “We just want to say thank you. We’ll be out here every night at 7:30.” RNAO encourages everyone to take part while also keeping in mind safe social distancing (maintaining at least two metres of distance between you and others). To see how others are cheering on frontline workers, visit RNAO on Twitter and Facebook, and search the hashtags #Cheer4HealthWorkers and #TogetherWeCanDoIt.

An ongoing nursing shortage at the Chelsey site of South Bruce Grey Health Centre (SBGHC) has led to a reduction in hours for the hospital’s emergency department, which has gone from 24/7 coverage to a 12-hour schedule (8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.). The new schedule will be in place until positions can be filled, says interim chief nursing officer Lynn Bos, who is recruiting RNs, but says they need more senior RNs with emergency department experience. “We have had some success recruiting new nurses in the last couple of months, however, these nurses are new graduates or have limited (emergency) experience,” she says. The situation at SBGHC is not unique as hospitals in rural communities often face challenges recruiting and retaining RNs. Nurses are required to develop a high degree of competency in a number of clinical domains and specialties, Bos suggests, and new graduates can often be unprepared to work in a rural setting without significant orientation and mentorship. (Owen Sound Sun Times, Jan. 8)

For the first time ever, Sudbury’s Wahnapitae First Nation has hired a full-time NP. “There was always a health centre here, and they did have some nurse practitioners who would come out on a contract basis,” says Rebecca Foreshew, the new primary care NP who will serve the community located within the city boundaries of Greater Sudbury. Foreshew previously worked at Health Sciences North and is now practising out of the reserve’s Norman Recollet Health Centre. She collaborates with the centre’s foot-care nurse and community wellness worker. “I’m the only nurse practitioner and there is no collaborating physician,” she explains. “You don’t necessarily need a collaborating physician, except when you need to order a CT or MRI, but a lot of the time the patient would be under specialist care at that point anyway.” Foreshew, who is originally from Sudbury, has experience working in Indigenous health. “I’ve thoroughly enjoyed working in remote and rural communities, and I think my end goal was always to work on a reserve,” she says. (The Sudbury Star, Nov. 4)