St. Amant, a centre in Winnipeg that treats people with developmental disabilities, acquired brain injury and autism, is seeing a shortage of nurses, reported their staff.
Bev Temple, a researcher with St. Amant and a professor in the nursing faculty at the University of Manitoba said, “As the population of people with developmental disabilities grows at St. Amant we need more and more nurses.”
“Right now at St. Amant our nurses are aging and as that keeps happening there will keep being a shortage.”
Some of the services that are offered at St. Amant are occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech language pathology, behavioural specialists, clinical dieticians, specialized services in the areas of seating and mobility, augmentative and assistive communication and specialized feeding times. St. Amant Centre also has programs that allow a person with a developmental disability to live at home with their family while a team from St. Amant helps the family to look after them.
“The goal is to provide an effective and efficient response to a behavioural crisis to prevent a break down,” said St. Amant director Jeff Butler.
To be a nurse at St. Amant you must be licensed and graduated from a college or university. The nurses that work there must have good basic nursing skills, know how to manage seizures and medication for patients.
“The nurses need to know and learn how to have good assessment skills. Nurses are dealing with people who can’t explain what is wrong with them,” said Temple.
“For example a person who does not have a developmental disability can easily tell a nurse or doctor if they are in pain, but a person with a developmental disability has trouble explaining if they are in pain.” said Temple.
Dauna Crooks, the dean of the nursing department at the U of M said, “Many nursing students express an interest in working with people with developmental disabilities, and some of them even volunteer on their own time.”
“We do have professors that teach students about people with developmental disabilities and things they need to know about how to deal with them.”
Temple, on the other hand, has her own opinion on what is taught here at the U of M. “I think at the U of M, the students are not taught well enough about people with developmental disabilities. Students need to be taken there so they can see first hand the things that these people go through.”
“It really is an eye opener,” she continued.
“Many nurses at St. Amant quit because they can find it too hard to deal with the people. What patients at St. Amant really need are nurses who appreciate them and care about them.”
“It’s very important for a nurse to have patience and a good heart to work with these types of people, because without patience and a good heart, nurses won’t last,” says Temple.
Temple’s research is involved in developing better ways to incorporate developmental disabilities information with students at the U of M. If any nursing students are interested in this type of research or any other research at St. Amant, please contact her at bev_temple@umanitoba.ca.
For other information regarding St. Amant, visit Stamant.mb.ca.
