Horizon Health leadership fielded staff concerns about a makeshift hospital unit in an ambulance bay as far back as a year before it came into the public eye.
Those concerns span from infection prevention to temperature issues and loud noise, and are captured in documents obtained through a right-to-information request.
The Medical Transition Unit, or MTU, at the Dr. Everett Chalmers Regional Hospital in Fredericton made headlines in January after several people went public with their experiences on the unit — which was without running water, bathrooms or beds.
Horizon said the unit opened in December 2024, in response to hospital overcrowding, as a temporary space for patients waiting for admission to hospital.
WATCH | Why some staff were worried about keeping patients in garage space:
Horizon staff had ‘major concerns’ about makeshift ambulance bay unit
Over a year, Horizon Health staff warned of substandard infection-prevention control and air quality, among other problems, after an ambulance bay was converted to hold patients, documents show.
But staff correspondence shows that the space became used more as a regular unit, with patients held there regularly for over a week.
After the public outcry in January, the network promised to move patients out of the ambulance bay and followed through in early April.
But long before that, documents show that staff within the hospital were sounding the alarm.
This story was brought to Nouzie by RSS. The original post can be found on https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/horizon-staff-ambulance-bay-unit-9.7165043?cmp=rss
