Our government has made unprecedented investments in health care and, this year, we will build on the many initiatives we have already undertaken to recruit and retain health care professionals, to enhance health care facilities and to improve health care services.
To increase the supply of physicians in this province, our government made a Blueprint commitment to expand the number of spaces for Newfoundland and Labrador medical students at the Memorial University Faculty of Medicine by 10 per cent in the coming year and 30 per cent within the next five years. An initial $4 million investment this year makes this commitment a reality.
To promote the recruitment and retention of
nurses, we are allocating about $2.1 million to finance new incentives. These will include $2,500 bursaries for third- and fourth-year nursing students who enter into one-year return-in-service agreements, relocation allowances averaging $5,000 to cover 50 per cent of moving costs to a maximum of $10,000, signing bonuses of $3,000 for difficult-to-fill positions, and special assistance to secure clinical placements.
Through a $1.5 million investment we will expand Memorial University
Schools of Social Work and Nursing, the
Centre for Nursing Studies and the Western Regional School of Nursing. We will increase the number of funded seats at our Schools of Nursing by 36 to 291. We will also expand the School of Social Work by increasing the undergraduate class size by 15 students to a total of 60, and increasing the Master of Social Work class size by 15 to a total of 30 which will strengthen the preparation of clinical leaders, supervisors and managers. New faculty will be added, the Bachelor of Social Work degree will be redeveloped as a four-year program and support will be provided to Child, Youth and Family Services through specialized training and consultation. These initiatives will support the development of advanced practice social workers, supervisors and managers to address the increasing complexity of social work case loads.
We are investing $400,000 to place nurse practitioners in hospital emergency rooms. In hospital ERs, nurse practitioners can assist in providing a timely response for non-urgent visits by performing assessments, doing minor suturing and ordering X-rays under the direction of a physician. This investment should help to reduce patient wait times in emergency rooms.
We are investing $1.1 million this year, and $2.2 million on an annual basis, for continued implementation of
short-term acute home care and short-term end of life services. Eighteen new positions, including registered nurses and licensed practical nurses, will be created starting in October to support such home care services as case management, nursing and personal care, home support and the provision of pharmaceuticals, medical supplies and equipment.
We are also allocating $6 million to increase the hourly rate for
home support, the fifth increase in the past three years. With each successive increase, we acknowledge that home support workers provide valuable support to many individuals in our province with disabilities, to seniors and to children, enabling many to remain in their own homes despite the challenges they face.
In addition to investing in health care professionals, we are investing $79.1 million this year in
capital infrastructure and we are more than doubling our funding to $33.5 million to address high priority repairs and renovations in health care facilities, bringing the total investment in such initiatives to $240 million over five years. We are working hard to fix problems that were left to accumulate under previous governments year after year.
Our investments this year will enable us to move forward on several key health care projects that will benefit the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.
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We will move forward with planning and site selection for a new hospital in Corner Brook.
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We will move forward with planning for new long-term care homes in St. John’s.
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We will continue planning for the redevelopment of the St. John’s hospitals, which serve people throughout our province.
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We will invest $4 million to improve ambulatory care at the Carbonear General Hospital.
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We will move forward with planning for renovations at the Central Newfoundland Regional Health Centre in Grand Falls-Windsor.
We are also dedicating $52 million for the purchase of new technology and equipment to replace aging and outdated
health equipment. Investments include 12 new digital mammography units in the province, new CT scanners for Clarenville and St. Anthony, a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine for the Central region, a new interventional angiography suite in Corner Brook, and a digital X-ray unit for St. Anthony. This funding is in addition to the $14 million investment in health equipment we approved in February and brings our total five-year investment in capital equipment to $128 million.
As well, planning will commence this year to acquire a
Positron Emission Tomography (PET) scanner for the province. The acquisition of this equipment will significantly augment existing technologies for cancer care and will involve an investment of up to $10 million. The PET scanner is designed primarily to assist physicians in planning treatment for those with cancer diagnoses, and its purchase will fulfill another Blueprint commitment.
We are allocating $5.8 million to the four
Regional Health Authorities to address unique priorities and invest in initiatives including the expansion of orthopedic services in Corner Brook, the consolidation of clinical and business information systems at Central Health, and the addition of portable oxygen to the benefit list under the Special Assistance program. An additional allocation of $26.7 million will enable the authorities to offset cost hikes from inflation and increased utilization of current programs including home support and services to children, youth and families.
As our population ages, we are determined to continue meeting the needs of seniors and others who require
long-term care and community support services. Our strategic vision is to ensure the system addresses the health and social needs of clients, encourages choice, promotes independence and mobility, and delivers quality services. We are dedicating $15 million this year to initiatives in line with this strategy.
Mr. Speaker, our commitment to strengthen our province’s health care system is strong and unwavering. In total, we are committing, on an annual basis, an additional $266 million for health operations this year over and above what we committed last year. We are also allocating an additional $133.5 million in capital funding this year. Our
total budget for Health and Community Services this year is an unprecedented $2.3 billion, and Newfoundlanders and Labradorians will notice the difference through improved health care facilities and services this year and in the years to come.
