The head of the Townsville Hospital says 80 new nurse positions will be created within the next year.
It has been two years since about 200 jobs were cut to improve efficiencies and running costs.
The hospital’s chief executive, Julia Squire, says despite the new positions, the 2012 job losses were necessary.
“But we needed to make sure that we [were] cutting our cloth according to our funding, so we made sure that the positions that we got filled we actually had a funding stream for, we redesigned our services,” she said.
“But in the last year we’re managed to take on more staff and actually in the year coming, the year that’s just started in July, we’re going to be taking on at least 80 additional nurses, for example.”
She says because of the cuts, it is now in a better position to build its workforce in areas of demand.
“That’s just fantastic news for the town, it’s fantastic news for our partner university at JCU [James Cook University] because it means that the student nurses that they’re putting through, we can offer positions to. It’s just good news all round really,” she said.