The Report

The Report: June 2011 vol.32 num.2 What is an attendance promotion program? Employers are increasingly using programs intended to reduce the amount of money they lose on the sick days taken by their employees. These programs have been around for a long time, and while at first they consisted largely of individual meetings with employees who seemed to be using...

The Report: June 2011 vol.32 num.2 HSA invited Andre Picard, health reporter for the Globe and Mail, to deliver a keynote address on the future of public health care in Canada. His speech touched on several recommendations for improving the system. Thank you for the kind introduction. But I recently changed my bio, courtesy of a politician who was angry...

The Report: June 2011 vol.32 num.2 CHILD AND YOUTH MENTAL HEALTH CLINICIAN Colette Barker has two jobs. One is with adults; one is with children. One deals with parenting; the other with youth sexuality. Both fully engage Barkers passion for helping people whose needs are easily overlooked or misunderstood. For instance, there are persistent misconceptions about children with sexual behaviour...

The Report: June 2011 vol.32 num.2 On the heels of a difficult ratification vote, HSA members from around the province gathered to do as theyve done for 40 years ... work together to meet the future challenges of an ever changing health care system. -OVER THE NEXT TWO DAYS, we will be focusing on the future of our union. Where...

The Report: April 2011 vol.32 num.1 WHEN I BECAME PRESIDENT OF HSA IN APRIL OF 2007 I made a commitment to leadership that relies on hearing, understanding, communicating, and acting on the priorities of the community that is our membership. I still stand by those words. Over the last few months, whether at ratification vote meetings around the province, in...

The Report: April 2011 vol.32 num.1 MEDICAL RADIATION TECHNOLOGIST Christin Lumsden credits an innovative school program for pointing her in the direction of a job she loves. She considers herself lucky to have found a profession that perfectly fits her interests: its varied, offers meaningful human relationships, lets her use sophisticated technology, and provides many opportunities for continual learning and...

The Report: April 2011 vol.32 num.1 IN AUGUST OF 2009, a violent patient at Eric Martin Pavillion punched a pyschiatric nurse. Then he kicked her. Then he beat her head repeatedly against the hard floor. The nurse was so severely injured she may never work again. After another violent incident just a few months later, in March, the patient was...

The Report: December 2010 vol.31 num.6 LIKE MOST BRITISH COLUMBIANS, I was both surprised, and not surprised, by Gordon Campbells resignation. Surprised by the exact timing; only a week earlier. Mr. Campbell had re-arranged his cabinet, hired a new chief of staff and press secretary, and spent $250,000 of your money on a prime-time TV broadcast announcing he planned to...

0 The Report: December 2010 vol.31 num.6 TILLY HISCOCK TAKES CARE OF HEARTS ... both literally and metaphorically. As a Pacemaker Technologist at Burnaby Hospital, she sees patients once or twice a year to make sure their pacemakers are functioning properly. So in a way, her job revolves around this life-saving battery-operated biomedical device that keeps hearts beating steadily. But...

The Report: December 2010 vol.31 num.6 WHEN TRINA NGUYEN ACCEPTED A POSITION as pharmacist at Surrey Memorial Hospital in 2006, she was definitely choosing the path less travelled ... at least, less travelled by recent graduates of university pharmacy programs. -Less than 10 per cent of pharmacy graduates go into hospitals. We are not trained for this in school; we...