Patients moved, elevators fail amid back-to-back incidents at aging Montreal hospital
A power outage left several elevators out of service at the centre of the Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital on Monday, affecting both patients and staff.
The latest incident at the beleaguered, aging hospital is yet another example of a facility in desperate need of renovations, according to pulmonologist Dr. Marc Brosseau.
'We've had recurring problems with the elevators since the spring. I believe in relation to the power, I heard that a significant number of elevators were out of service, which caused major delays in transporting patients and in visits from their families in the tower. It's a 10-storey tower, so having several elevators out always has an impact,' explained Brosseau.
The CIUSSS de l'Est-de-l'Île-de-Montréal said the neighbourhood outage was not related to construction work or the condition of the building.
In a statement, the CIUSSS said that the Montreal fire department requested an emergency power cut from Hydro-Québec.
Clara Meagher from the CIUSSS added that during the outage, generators maintained power in critical areas.
'In such situations, the mitigation plan involves slowing down certain activities, particularly imaging. This is the case in all hospitals across Quebec. We are doing the same with the elevators, keeping only the minimum number necessary for emergency transport of patients,' Meagher said.
Water leak the previous day
Just 24 hours before the power outage, a water leak forced patients in the intensive care unit to be moved to another area within the hospital in order for emergency repairs to be carried out, the CIUSSS confirmed.
According to Brosseau, the leak occurred in the coronary intensive care unit, where patients with serious heart conditions are treated. He said the leak originated from the ceiling, which then flooded part of the unit.
'Those recurring issues have an impact on morale and staff retention, on recruitment. We've had issues with the nursing shortage, especially on the night shift and this intensive care unit. This does not help,' Brosseau said.
'I mean, it's not normal to have these recurrent water leaks from the ceiling in a modern hospital. I think the emphasis is that the reconstruction has to go as quickly as possible, and Maisonneuve Rosemont would need some interim work to be done.'
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