By Bre McAdam

Appointments cancelled as Health Sciences Association members strike in Saskatoon

May 12, 2011 | 6:48 AM

About 130 health sciences workers from a variety of professions in Saskatchewan are on the picket lines as of Wednesday morning.

While the strike will not affect doctor and surgical appointments, certain appointments are being cancelled in Saskatoon.

“For example, with the Alvin Buckwold Child Development program we've had a significant number of staff be deemed on strike there, so we did have to go back and look at the services and cancel appointments,” said Karen Newman, director of employee relations for the Saskatoon Health Region.

However, Saskatchewan's Health Sciences Association president Cathy Dickson says there's been some confusion about who's supposed to be on the picket line, and who's not.

“We had an incident this morning where a couple of our members were on the essential services list, went to work and their manager told them 'no you're not essential, you're supposed to be on the picket line',” said Dickson.

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Newman says the mix-up is because the union has put individuals on strike instead of an entire service. That means just because a certain group such as hospital pharmacists is listed as on strike, it doesn't mean every worker in that category is off the job.

“For the most part we have deemed our pharmacists to be an essential service. Health sciences has only chosen to select a few individuals to be deemed on strike today, so the affect at this point in time is minimal.”

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