“Over the summer there could be gaps, but we’re committed to continue to work very hard with our community and within Horizon to close those gaps.”

That’s Nancy Parker, former Sackville Memorial Hospital nurse and Horizon manager, now tasked with the job of recruiting and retaining nurses at the small hospital which has had drastic service reductions due to a lack of available staff in recent years.

The Sackville hospital emergency department has had staffing issues for years, beginning in the months after a previous Horizon administration announced the permanent shutdown of overnight services at a number of small hospitals through the province. That announcement was almost immediately reversed, but the damage had been done, and nursing vacancies at the Sackville Memorial Hospital started to grow.

Then just over a year ago, Horizon announced a drastic reduction in emergency department hours at Sackville Memorial. And in December, at around the same time that Nancy Parker was hired, Horizon closed acute care beds at the hospital.

The message since then has been that Horizon is working towards re-staffing and re-storing services in the Sackville hospital, and Nancy Parker is part of that plan.

CHMA called up Parker last week to find out more about what she’s doing, and how its going.