Have nursing program, will travel

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This article was published 21/02/2025 (228 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Ashley Hunter has wanted to become a nurse for the better part of two decades, but her dreams may never have been realized if not for a travelling nursing program.

That’s because the 37-year-old Hunter, a mother of six boys ranging in age from 16 to four-year-old twins, was able to enrol in the practical nursing program Nursing offered by Assiniboine College, which rotates sites.

The program has come to her this year, in Beausejour.

“It would have been more challenging if it wasn’t here,” she said Friday after the grand opening of the program, which has been in session since last month.

“I originally took nursing right out of high school, but I coulnd’t continue. As the mom of six boys, it’s good to be close to home if something happens. It would have been more challenging if I had to go to Winnipeg or Brandon.”

In the Brandon-based college’s rotating rural program, which has existed for more than a decade, the college rents regional sites to hold classes for a year or two, and then moves to other locations.

Mark Frison, the college’s president, said in the last decade more than 1,500 nursing students have graduated.

Frison said the idea is to help regional health authorities — and hospitals and other health-care facilities — find nurses to hire and retain.

“We find if the people in the community take the course in the community they are more likely to stay to work in the community,” he said.

“That’s why we give the people who live in the community the best shot at getting in. The number of our graduates who choose to live and work in Manitoba is high.”

A report released last week by the Manitoba Nurses Union found vacancy rates were up to 21 per cent last summer, a jump from 16 per cent in the of summer 2020.

The union acknowledged those numbers may be improving, but noted overtime exceeded 1.1 million hours in 2024, up from 800,000 in 2021.

At the same time, the province spent $75 million for private-agency nurses to fill 1.2 million nursing hours.

The provincial government announced last week it had hired 481 nurses for hospitals across Manitoba.

Frison said the Beausejour program is at capacity, with 25 students who will graduate in the next two years.

“It helps when the health regions have trouble recruiting nurses,” he said. “This can reduce the need for (private) agency nurses.”

Frison said currently, besides Beausejour, rotating nursing programs are operating in Virden, Morden and Otterburne. The college has permanent sites in Brandon, Winnipeg, Dauphin and Portage la Prairie.

Beausejour Mayor Ray Schirle said he is pleased the college chose his town for its latest rural rotating site.

“We recognized the potential to enhance health-care services and create educational opportunities in Beausejour,” Schirle said. “We are thrilled to welcome Assiniboine College’s practical nursing program to our community to provide local students with valuable career opportunities, but also support the health-care needs of our community.”

Marion Ellis, CEO of the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority, said more health-care training spots are needed in rural communities and First Nations.

As for Hunter, she is already looking forward to graduating and beginning to work in her new career.

“My field of choice is emergency medicine,” she said. “I already know I’m going to stay in the Interlake close to here. I’m looking forward to it.”

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca