Magic Statistics

Soon after he was chosen leader of Quebec’s official opposition party, the Parti Québécois, André Boisclair appeared in a sophomoric television skit in which actors portrayed Prime Minister Stephen Harper and US President George W Bush as cowboys and homosexual lovers à la Brokeback Mountain.  Although the show was not supposed to air until late this month, inevitably the video was broadcast ahead of schedule and then plastered all over the internet.

Globe and Mail columnist Lysiane Gagnon thinks this could have disastrous consequences for the PQ’s electoral chances, especially since it's not Mr Boisclair’s first act of colossal bad judgment.

When Mr. Boisclair was running for the leadership of his party, he admitted that he had snorted cocaine when he was a cabinet minister in the Bouchard government — behaviour that indicated, at best, an appalling lack of judgment. The Brokeback Mountain parody also highlighted the fact that the 40-year-old Mr. Boisclair is gay and a self-described "party animal."

Quebec voters are more open to non-standard behaviour than the average Canadian, but there's a limit to what they can stomach from a party leader. Mr. Boisclair is already seen as an intellectual lightweight. For many, the sketch was the last straw.

Why would a man who wants to be elected premier of Quebec ridicule in such a puerile fashion the leaders of the most powerful political entities with whom he would have to deal?  Mr Boisclair’s ultimate ambition is to become the first head of state of an independent Quebec, but voters in the province may now find it impossible to take his aspiration seriously.

The broadcast of Boisclair’s folly devastated morale in the PQ caucus.  Many long-time party supporters tore up their membership cards in disgust.  Mr Boisclair’s predecessor as PQ leader, Bernard Landry, regrets resigning and openly says he wants his old job back.  Several party caucus members want him back, too.

For access to Ms Gagnon’s full column, click here.

Nurses report work stress, job dissatisfaction, and physically demanding jobs to a significantly greater extent than average employed Canadians.  Findings from a wide-ranging survey of Canadian nurses also indicate that job stress and other psychological and social pressures at work are related to health problems and absenteeism among nurses.

The first-ever National Survey of the Work and Health of Nurses examined links between their work environment and health. It found that nurses face a broad range of physical and emotional challenges in a demanding, often hectic, workplace.

The proportion of nurses who reported a high level of work stress (as determined by the level of job strain, physical demands, and support from co-workers and supervisors) was higher than that for employed people overall. Job strain results when the psychological demands of a job exceed the worker's discretion in deciding how to do it.

Nearly one-third (31%) of female nurses were classified as having high job strain. The figure for all employed women was 26%.

Job strain was strongly related to fair or poor physical and mental health, and to lengthy or frequent absences from work for health-related reasons. For example, 17% of nurses who perceived high job strain reported 20 or more sick days in the past year, compared with 12% of nurses who perceived less job strain.

Almost half of nurses reported low support from co-workers; more than 60% said their jobs were physically demanding; and 12% said they were dissatisfied with their jobs.  Those proportions are all significantly higher than those reported by all employed Canadians.  On the other hand, well over 80% of nurses reported good working relations, teamwork, and collaboration with physicians.

Over one-third of nurses said that, in the year preceding the survey, they had suffered pain severe enough that they were unable to carry out normal daily activities.  Over half had missed work due to on-the-job physical injury.

Over one-quarter of nurses who provide direct patient care were physically assaulted by patients in the previous year.  The probability of male nurses being attacked by a patient was twice that of female nurses.  Almost half of all nurses reported emotional abuse from a patient; males were slightly more likely to have been emotionally abused.

Nurses are much more likely than average Canadian employees to work paid and unpaid overtime.  (See chart.)  Also, about half or more reported having too much work for one person, missing breaks due to work pressures, etc.

Three in 10 nurses reported that they usually worked paid overtime at their main job—an average of 5.4 extra hours per week. Compared with Canadian workers overall, much higher proportions of nurses worked paid overtime.

Unpaid overtime was even more common among nurses than paid overtime.  Nearly half reported usually working unpaid overtime at their main job, for an average of 4 such hours per week.
. . .
Over half (54%) of nurses said that they often arrived at work early or stayed late in order to get their work done; 62% reported working through breaks. Two-thirds (67%) often felt that they had too much work for one person, and 45% said that they were not given enough time to do what was expected in their job.

The average age of nurses is higher than that of all employed Canadians aged 21 or more.  Females nurses average over 44 years of age, compared to 41 for all employed Canadian women.  Male nurses average almost 43 years, about one year more than all employed men.

In 2005, Canada had 314,900 employed nurses, of whom 95% were female.  Over 19,000 nurses participated in the survey, which was conducted by Statistics Canada in partnership with the Canadian Institute for Health Information and Health Canada.

The full 189-page report can be downloaded here (pdf).  The chart in this post is found on page 41 (numbered page 17) of that document.

Sources:

Statistics Canada, 2006. "National Survey of the Work and Health of Nurses, 2005". The Daily, 11 December. Statistics Canada catalogue no. 85-570-XIE.  http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/061211/d061211b.htm (accessed 11 December 2006).

Shields, Margot, 2006. Findings from the 2005 National Survey of the Work and Health of Nurses. Co-published by Health Canada and Canadian Institute for Health Information.  Statistics Canada catalogue no. 83-003-XIE  http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/83-003-XIE/83-003-XIE2006001.pdf (accessed 11 December 2006).

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