They’re often the first medical professional you see on the way in, and one of the last ones you see on the way out.

While doctors often get all of the glory, the health care system would grind to a halt without nurses. From May 7-13, Canada celebrates National Nursing Week. This year’s theme, according to the Canadian Nurses Association (CNA), is #YesThisIsNursing. International Nurses Day is celebrated on May 12, the anniversary of Florence Nightingale’s birth.

The theme was suggested by Alliah Over, a Registered Nurse (RN) from Newmarket, Ontario. It was also the theme last year. According to the CAN, Over described her inspiration as relating to the growing list of tasks nurses complete daily.

“Nursing roles are evolving at an exponential rate, particularly with the influence of technology and the expansion of digital technologies,” Over said.

“We can leverage social media to raise awareness, promote advocacy and connect people across the globe on important issues. For me, this theme speaks to the expanding traditional and non-traditional roles, settings and sectors nurses work in as well as the unique opportunities for our profession presented by social media and emerging tech trends.”

The importance of nurses isn’t lost on Victoria Hospital Foundation executive director Sherry Buckler.

“We wouldn’t have a hospital if we didn’t have nurses,” she said.

“They’re as important as the doctors.”

Several organizations are celebrating National Nursing Day around the city. One such celebration has been set up in the Victoria Hospital lobby.

Melissa Sawicki is overseeing that celebration, a fundraiser for the Saskatchewan Nurses Foundation, an organization that supports education for nursing in the province. Last year, the fundraiser earned $1,649.

‘We want to showcase and celebrate registered nursing and nursing of all sorts here,” Sawicki said.

“We have goodies, prizes we’re showcasing nursing and we have a raffle as well.”

The booth will be set up from 1-3 p.m. all week at the hospital. Sawicki and other volunteers are also available to answer any questions people may have.

Also, for the second year, they’re offering people a chance to talk about their best nursing memory.

“It’s how nursing has impacted your life or your family’s life in a positive way,” Sawicki said. The memories are collected, with the winner chosen by a student to be showcased in the Saskatchewan Registered Nurses’ Association magazine.

“The person who won last year (talked) about when she worked at the hospital where the transplant team from Edmonton had phoned and said there was a liver waiting for one of her patients. That was the most thoughtful memory and the students chose it last year.”

A University of Saskatchewan student will be by Friday to choose this year’s best memory. But the other memories also mean a lot to nurses like Sawicki.

“I keep them all,” she said.

“We’re talking to SRNA right now about a way to showcase them and about how nice it would be for everybody to see. You’re seeing impacts in so many ways and everybody’s memories are unique and special.”

Sawicki reflected on the importance of celebrating nurses and all they do.

“They really are the front line on nursing care, no matter if that’s in hospital or if that’s out in the community,” she said.

“We really wanted to just showcase how beneficial it is for nurses in our community, especially here in the north.”

Buckler also spoke about the importance of recognizing the contributions of nurses.

“Many people take for granted the work, the sacrifice and the passion nurses put into their jobs and into taking care of us,” she said.

“The least we can do is stop and pause and think about that work, that sacrifice and that time they provide their community, and say thank you and that we appreciate them during this week.”

The Lakeland Fire Department received assistance from the provincial wildfire management branch in containing a fire near the southeast part of the Village of Christopher Lake Sunday.

According to the fire department’s Facebook page, five Lakeland Fire Department trucks and 19 crew responded to the wildfire. They also received assistance from three wildfire management crews and air tankers. The fire grew to a total of 6.8 hectares in size before being brought under control, according to data from the province’s wildfire management website.

Throughout Sunday afternoon and into the evening, air tankers could be seen taking off from the Prince Albert airport.

As of 9 p.m., wildfire management remained to work on hot spots, but the fire had been put out. Crews will return in the morning to ensure the fire is fully out.

The fire was one of a few burning in the Prince Albert wildfire management area Sunday. Four other fires were marked as contained. One was burning 13 hectares near Wahpeton, a mere 13 km from Prince Albert. Another fire, this one about 3.7 hectares in size, was burning about 20 km north of Kinistino. The other two fires were burning near Highway 793, about 20 km west of Debden.

Two other out of control fires continue to burn. A 50 hectare fire is burning near Cumberland House, and a 4.5 hectare fire was out of control near Buffalo Narrows. A total of 12 fires are burning province-wide. So far there have been 90 wildfires inn 2018, well ahead of the five-year average of 48 for this time of year.

While there are no fire bans in place, central and southwestern Saskatchewan, including Prince Albert, remain under extreme wildfire risk. The majority of the rest of the province is at high risk, with only a small portion of southeast Saskatchewan, and the far north of the province, at moderate risk.

Vigil held Wendesday night to remember the 128 people missing from Saskatchewan

Nine chairs sat empty in front of City Hall Wednesday night, lined up in a lonesome row as a small group of observers looked on, holding lit candles, and observed a moment of silence.

The nine chairs were symbolic of the nine missing persons cases Prince Albert Police have open right now. Those nine cases are some of the 128 open cases long-term in the province, and the more than 100,000 people who are reported missing across Canada every year. The nine names missing in Prince Albert were read as a real reminder of the families who still suffer when someone is missing.

“There are always going to be positive outcomes and there are always going to be negative outcomes,” Prince Albert North Search and Rescue (PANSAR) representative Chrissy Halliday.

“One of the most positive recent outcomes that I’ sure is on everyone’s mind is Jim Mumm from Shellbrook. He went missing last week and was found within 48 hours. He is alive and well and has been returned to his family.
“Then there are the negatives, the still missing. They are the people we need to remember.”

Halliday helped put the vigil together. It was held in honour of missing persons week, held in Saskatchewan from April 29 to May 5. The vigil was attended by representatives from PANSAR, the police, the fire department, victim services and concerned community members.

“Anyone can go missing, regardless of gender, age, ethnicity or educational background,” Halliday said.

“People go missing for a variety of reasons, including mental illness, miscommunication, misadventure, domestic violence and, of course, victims of crime. These are not the only reasons but they are a few.”

For some families, not knowing what has happened to their loved ones can be the hardest part. Mikayla Worth sees that on a regular basis. She’s the missing persons liaison with Prince Albert Victim Services.

“My specialty is dealing with ambiguous loss,” she said.

‘That’s how you’re feeling not knowing what’s going on when a loved one is missing, and how to cope with dealing with the unknown. We provide the services to help families in any way, shape or form.”

Victim Services and the Prince Albert police were also hoping to clear up misconceptions about missing persons, such as the requirement that you have to wait 24 hours (you don’t), that only family can report someone missing (others can too) and that a cold case means a closed case.

“When someone goes missing or is missing for a long time, the family, the police service and the community are faced with a lot of unknowns,” said Staff Sgt. Dave Schluff.

“That is very difficult and very trying for family. We want to be compassionate and empathetic to families of missing people, and we want to never give up. If somebody is missing, that file will never close. We’re always searching and looking for answers. If a person is missing, that file will remain open forever.”

While the police are often the first point of contact for missing persons investigations, Halliday and others spoke about what else happens and who else gets involved to prevent people from going missing and to respond when somebody does.

If police think someone can be found relatively quickly with assistance, ground search and rescue groups — like PANSAR — are called in.

“We’re ground search and rescue. We go through the bush, we walk city streets, there’s a variety of ways we will come and find you,” Halliday said.

The group is made up of what Halliday calls “professional volunteers.” None of them are paid, but they’re all trained up to a set of standards. They’re also trained in preventative search and rescue, where they train people, such as children, what to do in case they get lost or go missing.

Other groups, such as the Saskatchewan and the Prince Albert Council of Women, work to eliminate risk factors, such as violence against women.

“We have been urging government for many years now to address the many aspects of violence against women,” said Randi Arnot, the president of the Saskatchewan Council of Women.

‘We walk humbly beside the many people who are on a journey of grieving, and we are so very thankful of those of you on your own difficulty journey as people willing to work on the frontlines. E thank you and stand committed with you to continue to work for social change.”

Premier Scott Moe had strong words for the Governments of Canada and B.C. during a post-budget luncheon in Prince Albert Tuesday.

Moe was responding to a question from a member of the business community about B.C’s efforts to block the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline. The event was hosted by the Prince Albert and District Chamber of Commerce. While Finance Minister Donna Harpauer was the one taking questions, when someone asked about the pipeline, she deferred to the Premier, who was also in attendance.

“We’ve been very vocal over the past number of weeks to the point where we’ve actually introduced a piece of legislation in the house that makes every free-trading bone in my body ache. It’s a piece of legislation that’s essentially turn-off-the-taps legislation,” he said.

“It’s unfortunate that we are in the situation where we even need to talk like this.”

Moe said the Saskatchewan economy, and the Canadian economy, loses out because it can only ship to the US. The pipeline would allow prairie oil to get to tidewater on the BC coast.

“We need access to that tidewater and we’ve been very vocal with our federal government. The fact of the matter is this is in their jurisdiction,” he said.

Moe said his government has commended the federal government where they deserve credit. While he thinks the government already has jurisdiction, he indicated he supports actions taken by the feds to introduce legislation or an order-in-council to re-assert their jurisdiction.

“Please do it quickly,” Moe implored.

He also said he would like the federal government to take stronger punitive action, similar to what it has done to Saskatchewan as the province has refused to sign on to a carbon pricing scheme.

“We’ve said they should go further,” Moe said.

“They just signed a $4.1 billion infrastructure deal with B.C., and they should hold those infrastructure dollars or a portion of those infrastructure dollars until B.C. starts to pull back on their meddling. They should hold some of those dollars because this is an area where the federal government clearly has jurisdiction, and they have shown they will withhold those dollars in areas where they don’t have jurisdiction. They should use every tool in their tool belt, and that includes withholding infrastructure funding to that province.”

Moe’s comments were appreciated by those in attendance, who responded with raucous applause.

Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe and Finance Minister Donna Harpauer addressed a pair of local priorities during a post-budget luncheon stop in Prince Albert Tuesday.

The luncheon was originally planned for the week following the provincial budget, but as Harpauer is the MLA for Humboldt, she cancelled her public speaking engagements while dealing with fallout from the tragic Humboldt Broncos bus crash.

During her speech, Harpauer heralded funding increases, including those that will impact people in Prince Albert, including increased funding for school divisions, a measure promised by Moe in response to backlash from the last budget’s $54 million cut to school division operational funding.

But in responding to questions from attendees and journalists following the event, Harpauer and Moe addressed a pair of priorities brought up by interested parties recently: A new hospital and targeted funding for mental health supports in schools.

Moe campaigned during the leadership race on building a new, fully funded hospital for Prince Albert once the budget was back to balance. While the government is still committed to building a new hospital for Prince Albert and the region, the timeline has become a bit fuzzy.

“The timeline will be when we can afford it,” Moe told reporters after the event.

“With respect to our infrastructure investment, we have a number of … projects coming to fruition.”

Moe cited the Jim Pattison Children’s Hospital and the new psychiatric facility in North Battleford. He also said the government has directed infrastructure dollars to highways, roads and new schools.

“We do always have projects coming off and projects that will be going on that are determined each budget,” he said.

“We’ve committed to not only the funding of the Prince Albert hospital, but to the full funding of the Prince Albert hospital, the understanding that it is a northern service to people not only in the surrounding area of Prince Albert, but across the north as well, and it’s a valued service to the province. As we continue on our path to balance, I won’t give a date on when we will be moving forward, but as we balance the budget here in the province, that is one of the projects of highest priority.”

Prince Albert Northcote MLA Nicole Rancourt, a member of the official opposition, was also in attendance Tuesday. She expressed disappointment that the original timeline had changed.

“There was no funding put in place or even a plan put in place on seeing a new hospital in Prince Albert,” she said. “I’d like to see an actual plan being put forward.”

Harpauer emphasized that in terms of health infrastructure, a new hospital for Prince Albert is the priority.

“I believe P.A. is most likely the next major capital project in health care,” she said. Harpauer also explained why that project wasn’t specifically included in capital spending projections in this budget.

“The capital plan will just be a capital commitment,” she explained. “All of our capital is included. It isn’t sectioned out. It would be too difficult to project years in advance in that manner.”

She also responded to concerns raised by a group of social work students from First Nations University calling on a dedicated funding envelope for mental health supports in schools.

The students were concerned after seeing the Catholic school division in Prince Albert eliminate a contract with Catholic Family Services to provide in-school mental health counsellors at the elementary level. The cut was due to budget constraints.

“That was on our radar already midyear in the previous budget,” she said.

“There were talks of different school divisions making staff cuts. That’s why in the third quarter of our previous budget we put a $7.5 million injection into (education) so school divisions that were having pressures could maintain staffing they felt were critical.”

Harpauer emphasized the autonomy of school divisions to spend that money how they think is best. She also highlighted the increased funding in the health care budget for mental health supports, including a pilot project for mental health supports in schools based on a similar project in Alberta.

The social work students, in their letter, had praised improvements like the pilot program, but had asked for something longer-term and sustained.

Rancourt would also like to see dedicated funding for mental health supports in schools.

“Families are saying that there are continued long wait times and children aren’t getting the services,” she said.

“We know that there used to be services within our schools, especially in Prince Albert, but due to the lack of funding for the health region and the school system, those services are no longer available. We have to ensure we have services available for children and youth where they can access it and where it will be most applicable. Our suicide rates are unreal. Our children are dying. This government needs to start making a real priority.”

Moe: Rural crime prevention programs to roll out soon

While speaking to media after the Finance Minister’s speech and question and answer session, Moe also spoke briefly about the province’s rural crime prevention plans. He said work is underway to roll out the Provincial Response Team, which consists of conservation officers, highway officers and additional RCMP officers. He said that team is just the first step in an ongoing plan.

“The RCMP are just unable to be everywhere,” Moe said.

“The provincial Response Team is one of the first and early steps you’ll see come into force as we speak over the next number of weeks and months.”

He said the conversation surrounding rural crime will continue.

“We need to … go further in the way of rural crime watches, organizing those, and in the way of what opportunities we have to incorporate some of the technology sector in addressing rural crime and protecting our properties. The response team is a start, and we need to continue to have the conversation with our residents across the province of Saskatchewan and continue to address what is a serious issue for all of us.”