Each of Jacque Blache’s patients are in slightly different hospital rooms – some have four beds, some have two and others are singles.

Each room is set up a little differently. The blood pressure cuff could either be on the left side or the right side of the bed, or even hiding behind the hospital curtain. Oxygen tanks are awkwardly placed, missing, or shared between patients.

Blache is a clinical nurse leader specializing in mental health and addictions. She said her unit’s inefficient design means she spends more time fiddling with equipment and less time with patients.

But the new patient care unit under construction at the Royal Jubilee Hospital promises to change that.

The new centre will have 83 per cent identical, single rooms. Sinks, oxygen tanks, vacuums and light switches will all be in the same place.

Most importantly, Blache said, she will be able to spend more time caring for her patients. “I could see saving at least an hour (per shift) trying to find your way around and work your way around equipment and all sorts of bodies in a four-bed ward.”

Robyne Maxwell, a nurse and clinical services director for the project, said the new design will “help to reduce errors and make people comfortable and familiar with it ... You’ll know where everything is, it will be familiar to you.”

Maureen Dentoom has been a nurse for 27 years and specializes in geriatric and gastro-intestinal medicine. She said poor organization means she often works hours of overtime after her regularly shift.

“Your patients come first, so you’re spending another hour or hour and-a-half after your 12-hour shift doing all your paper work,” she said. “That’s the only quiet time you’ve got, because now there’s another set of staff (on shift).”

A 2005 Statistics Canada study reported nurses in B.C. work longer hours than the national average. More than 40 per cent of nurses usually worked more than 40 hours per week. The same survey asked nurses about the quality of care in their last shift. About 16 per cent of B.C. nurses reported their nursing team delivered fair or poor care. This was the highest proportion in the country, compared with the national average of 12 per cent.

“In an eight-hour shift, you’re doing 12 hours worth of work,” Blache said. “I’m so happy and appreciative to be able to do what I need to do in eight hours ... and (have) time to visit with my patients and talk to them. That’s huge for morale – to want to come back to work the next day in this environment.”

Blache and Dentoom both said they’ll have more time to sit and talk with patients with the extra hour of time they expect to have in their day.

And patients will be able to absorb information better too, because the distraction of other patients in shared rooms won’t be there.

Blache will also be able to do bedside computerized charting, cutting down on her after hours paper work.

The building is set to be completed by the end of next year, and patients should start moving in by February 2011.

lweighton@vicnews.com