AMM backs rural lab, X-ray techs

A Westman resolution to improve education for rural lab and X-ray technicians was passed with 97 per cent support at this week’s Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM) convention.

The resolution, which was sponsored by eight municipalities — all in Westman — calls on the province to expand the number of seats it has in existing training programs and develop partnerships with out-of-province institutions to allow rural students access to immediate training opportunities.

It also calls for the province to create a rural-focused training and retention strategy and fast-track the launch of Assiniboine College’s combined laboratory and X-ray technology program to begin prior to 2027.

Sandra Clark, reeve of the Municipality of Two Borders, which sponsored the resolution, said while the province is funding extended hours at the Melita hospital, the hospital needs the workers to keep up those hours.

“We are looking for lab and X-ray to be available to us after those late clinical hours, so that if you present with a broken leg, you can come back the next morning and get an X-ray,” Clark told the Sun shortly after the AMM convention ended on Thursday.

The Melita Health Centre’s emergency department closed in September 2023 because of a nurse shortage, Clark said, “and we never recovered from that.”

“It’s imperative that we use nurse practitioners and our diagnostic teams to deliver health care to some of the most rural residents in Manitoba.”

She said a rural initiative is important. Most of the people who come to work at a small hospital are the ones who grew up in the area.

“We know we’re not going to bring lab and X-ray students out from Winnipeg, and so the more rural initiatives we can foster, the better off rural is,” Clark said.

She added that’s also true for other positions, like doctors.

Another reeve in the region said the 2027 timeline for Assiniboine College’s program doesn’t help today’s shortage.

“The need is now, we have vacant positions now,” Deloraine-Winchester Reeve Kelly McMachon said on Friday.

Taxpayers across the province spend their money on the service, so the lack of technicians means “we’re kind of being shorted on our tax dollars,” McMachon said.

He’s hoping the Assiniboine College program can open sooner than its current timeline.

Advanced Training and Education Minister Renée Cable said that while she wishes that could happen, it’s just not possible.

“The reality in terms of construction timelines and everything — the timelines that we have on that build and when the program starts is what it is,” Cable said.

She has been in conversations with Brandon Mayor Jeff Fawcett and Assiniboine College president Mark Frison about the opening date, which won’t be moved forward.

“Unfortunately, I don’t have a time machine. But it’s moving,” she said.

The province is currently looking to get better training closer to home, she said, which includes both rural and northern areas.

“We have training from Altona to Churchill, rural, rotating licensed practical nurses, health-care aides, and we’re looking at expanding all of those programs,” she told the Sun.

Partners, including Assiniboine College and Red River College Polytechnic, have been instrumental in providing local training, Cable added.

“We are actively working to ensure that people in all corners of the province know that there is a job for them in health care,” she said. “We want to be able to offer training closer to home for students.”

Training and retention strategies would also include pinpointing interested children in schools, and help them transition to post-secondary smoothly, the minister said.

While reeves have also asked for inter-provincial partnerships, Cable said the main goal is to keep people in Manitoba.

“What we want is for more Manitobans to train here. We have fantastic post-secondary institutions.”

“In the cases that we aren’t able to offer that specific training here in the province, we want folks to come home.”

That includes return-to-service agreements, which would see students return to rural areas.

Nick Krawetz, AMM’s deputy executive director, said a response to the resolution from the province will come around February.

Based on that response, the AMM will continue to do research, like polling. The responses often come with suggestions on who to speak to, and what research to do.

“It helps with advocacy. If we gather data, we can gather local examples, local insights, and that all feeds into making a (stronger) case that the issue should be addressed,” Krawetz said.

Along with Two Borders and Deloraine-Winchester, the resolution was sponsored by Brenda-Waskada, Carberry, Elton, Melita, Souris-Glenwood and Wallace-Woodworth.

The Sun reached out to the mayor of Carberry and the reeves of Elton and Wallace-Woodworth, but didn’t hear back from them by press time.

» alambert@brandonsun.com