BRHC included on premier’s ‘listening tour’

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This article was published 28/11/2023 (714 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Front-line health-care workers in Westman will have a chance to share their ideas, concerns and priorities with the province’s premier and health minister during an upcoming listening tour.

Premier Wab Kinew and Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara will travel across the province starting in early December, with a plan to visit seven hospitals. The Brandon Regional Health Centre (BRHC) will be the fourth stop.

During the listening tour, front-line workers need to know that they can speak freely, without threat of retribution, to a government that values their expertise and cares about them, Kinew said during a news conference from Winnipeg on Monday.

“Through this exercise we’ll connect with nurses, technicians, physicians, aides, support staff, folks throughout the hospitals, long-term care facilities and other health-care settings and in the community in Manitoba, who know very well what we can do locally to improve things on the front lines,” Kinew said.

“And then not only are we going to listen to your good ideas, but we are going to act upon them.”

Three of the hospitals listed on the listening tour are in Winnipeg. Grace Hospital is scheduled for Dec. 8, followed by a stop at Health Sciences Centre and Victoria General. Other health-care facilities on the list are Bethesda Regional Health Centre in Steinbach, Selkirk Mental Health Centre and Thompson General Hospital.

In Westman, BRHC is listed as the fourth stop, but it’s not yet known when Kinew, Asagwara and other members of the government will be in Brandon to speak with front-line health-care workers.

Asked by the Sun what local health-care workers can do to prepare for his and the health minister’s visit, Kinew said to prepare for questions.

“We intend to ask a couple of very important questions, such as what is preventing you from doing the job that you want to do right now? And what could we do to help you deliver on that job as you envision it?

“I think that these questions are really geared towards finding solutions to support people on the front lines in the local settings, where you work,” Kinew told the Sun.

Before becoming a member of the legislative assembly and now the province’s health minister, Asagwara was a psychiatric nurse and addictions specialist. People in Brandon, Asagwara said, should “just come prepared to share openly and honestly.”

“We’re a government that genuinely cares and wants to listen and wants to lead health care in the same way that health-care workers provide care to Manitobans — that’s with compassion,” Asagwara told the Sun.

The hour-long, in-person sessions will be attended by the premier or the health minister, according to the Shared Health website.

For those who work in health care but are unable to attend the meetings, an online tool will be set up for those people to submit their comments.

It is expected that the online tool will be up and running before the first stop on the listening tour on Dec. 8.

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