MGH's main entrance on Coxwell Avenue is closed as the next phase of our redevelopment project begins. Patients and visitors can use the new temporary main entrance on Sammon Avenue between Coxwell Avenue and Knight Street. View our campus map.
As the weather turned cooler, plans for surge preparedness were well underway at Michael Garron Hospital (MGH). The hospital knew it would face a challenge: continue to provide high-quality, patient-centred care as the volume of patients surged with the progression of respiratory season.
In preparation for surge, MGH needed to significantly accelerate the hiring of nurses. This rapid recruitment created an operational imperative: ensuring a much larger-than-normal number of new hires could be onboarded, trained and ready to practice safely and confidently within tight timelines. At the time, the existing onboarding program could accommodate approximately 26 nurses per month, requiring the model to quickly adapt and scale up to meet surge-related workforce demands.
Multiple teams came together to make this happen. Clinical resource leaders, Nursing Practice and Education, Information Technology (IT), Health Information Management and administration staff worked rapidly to increase capacity for onboarding and training.
“It’s a testament to the culture of teamwork at MGH to see how quickly teams mobilized towards helping our nurses onboard. Within two weeks, MGH was able to build our capacity to onboard up to 80 nurses a month,” says Wendy Cheuk, Director of Nursing, Interprofessional Practice & Education, Patient Experience, Spiritual Health, Academic Affairs & Ethics.
One strategy used to scale up onboarding was expanding the capacity for new hires to attend simulation and classroom training. This was a coordinated effort with the IT and Health Information Management teams to secure laptops and ensure staff were available to lead training sessions.
“The ability to onboard additional nurses meant not only needing the physical space for people to train in but also the digital infrastructure to be in place for nurses to complete training in computer programs that are crucial to their job” says Rozina Ramrattan, Corporate Clinical Resource Leader at MGH.
While more people were being onboarded, it was essential to ensure the onboarding program remained high-quality and informative. MGH’s advanced practice nurse educators played large roles in expanding orientation and ensuring the program went off without a hitch.
"Clinical resource leaders and interprofessional team members come together to take part in training and onboarding. Everyone was very responsive in accommodating additional orientation sessions,” says Alicia Zavitz, Advanced Practice Nurse Educator.
“We planned ahead and anticipated any roadblocks that could come up. As advanced practice nurse educators, we stepped in to cover any gaps in teaching to ensure new nurses were able to get the training they needed,” says John Buado, Advanced Practice Nurse Educator.
“I’m grateful that I was able to learn the processes and systems at MGH quickly with a thorough onboarding program. Everyone I met during orientation was so welcoming and knowledgeable,” says Janelle, Registered Nurse, who was hired in November.
“I know support continues to be available to me through nursing leadership and my fellow colleagues, even after my official orientation is over.”
MGH’s ability to rapidly scale its most valuable resource – its people – demonstrates a strong commitment to patient‑centered care during periods of increased demand. With this expanded onboarding model in place, the hospital is well positioned to respond quickly and effectively to future workforce needs.
