Some hospitals still short of volunteers

Press, 10 February 1989, Page 5

Some hospitals still short of volunteers

By

SARAH SANDS

Volunteers are urgently needed to help in Canterbury’s two psychiatric hospitals during the strike by hospital workers next Tuesday.

Sunnyside and Templeton hospitals need 300 volunteers each to cope during the strike by nurses, domestic workers, orderlies and other health professionals next week. By 4.30 p.m. yesterday Templeton had only 75 volunteers and Sunnyside only 125, the acting general manager of the Canterbury Hospital Board, Mr Ron Parker, said. Coronation Hospital also needed volunteers urgently, having only 30 of the 100 it needed, he said. "These are the hospitals we will be concentrating on in the next few days.”

Princess Margaret Hospital still needs 100 volunteers and Christchurch Hospital still needs another 20 to make its full complement of 200 volunteers, Mr Parker said. Burwood, Christchurch Women’s and Jubilee Hospitals all have the required number of volunteers, he said. So far about 800 volunteers have come forward in response to the board’s call for more than 1000 helpers during the 24hour strike. Some senior secondary school pupils will be working at Burwood Hos-

pital with the permission of their schools, Mr Parker said. The Nurses’ Union has called on private hospital nurses not to accept work normally done by their public sector counterparts during the strike next Tuesday. The union’s national secretary, Ms Steph Breen, said any attempts to transfer to the private sector work usually done by State sector nurses would be resisted. “The Nurses’ Union fully supports the action to be taken by the State sector health workers.”