Province hopes new reinstatement path will make it easier for former Manitoba nurses to return to workforce

The province hopes changes it has made with nursing colleges in Manitoba will make it easier for former nurses to start working in the health-care system again.

Health Minister Uzoma Awagwara announced Wednesday that the government is working with three regulatory bodies to help former nurses who are not currently working, but have worked in the province’s health-care system in the last five years, get back into the field more quickly.

“You have answered the call once before, and we are asking you to answer it again,” Asagwara said at a news conference at the College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba.

“We need you, and the time is now.”

The three regulatory bodies — the College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba, the College of Licensed Practical Nurses of Manitoba and the College of Psychiatric Nurses of Manitoba — will lower the number of recent practice hours required for licensed practical nurses, registered nurses and registered psychiatric nurses to be reinstated.

Those nurses may be eligible for practicing while supervised, a “targeted range of coursework” or a conditional license while they work to complete the required number of hours needed for registration, said Deb Elias, CEO of the College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba, at the news conference.

“We know that the current challenges in staffing nurses in the public health system require an all-hands-on-deck approach,” she said.

Deb Elias is the CEO of the College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba. (Gavin Axelrod/CBC)

The changes are effective immediately, the province said in a news release. By this spring, the province hopes to have regulatory amendments in place that make those changes permanent.

The former nurses must also be in good standing with their respective regulatory college.

‘Very good step’ to address nursing shortage: union president 

Nurses wanting to get back on the job can do so anywhere in Manitoba, Asagwara said. They could also play more of a mentorship role to newer nursing grads working in the field.

“We are asking you to come back, take paid positions in a role where your expertise could be put to great work and support newer nurses,” said Asagwara.

The minister didn’t say how many nurses the province expects to lure back, but promised the program’s effectiveness will be monitored.

“We’re very eager to see how many nurses will return and we’re going to be tracking that data. It’s really important for us to measure this,” Asagwara said.

Darlene Jackson, president of the Manitoba Nurses Union, said the changes are a “very good step” to addressing the critical nursing shortage in the province.

She also said having more experienced nurses work in the field again can make new grads feel more supported — and, in turn, could help them stay in the workforce.

The province is also planning on creating a new accreditation path that it says will make it easier for internationally trained nurses to work in Manitoba.

That work is currently underway, Asagwara said.

During the pandemic, former nurses could apply for expedited temporary registration, but Elias, the nursing college’s CEO, said it didn’t make sense for the colleges to create a process like that again.

“We wanted something a bit more of a long term solution for this as opposed to the temporary measures that we took during the pandemic,” she said.

Former nurses who want to return to work should contact their regulatory college for more information, Elias added.