Stories

A first time for Human Resources, the department had a summer Co-op student join the team. Alysha Rasmussen immersed herself into each subdivision of the HR department, shadowing various members to understand the in’s and out’s of a multifaceted HR department in healthcare. I sat down with Alysha to learn about her experience and how she hopes it influences future co-op students.

Julie Kille has been a part of the Providence Health Care team for over 10 years, starting as a staff nurse and working her way up to operations leader of Urban Health & HIV.  Recently, Julie was seconded to work as the clinical practice lead for HIV for the Regional HIV Program, encompassing both Vancouver Coastal Health and Providence Health Care.

Julie, what is it about the culture at St. Paul’s that made you want to make it your home?

Shelly finished 2nd overall (1st in her age category) at the Fresh Air Cherry Blossom triathlon in Kelowna in May and 2nd in her age group again at the June Shawnigan Lake triathlon. More recently she was delighted to finish the Victoria Half Ironman in less than 5 hours, securing a podium spot in her age group. With results like this we figured she’d be a good person to speak with ahead of a sunny summer in Vancouver!

How did you end up where you are now?
I grew up in Kamloops and was trained as a nurse in Victoria, but most of my ~40 year career was spent as an OR nurse at other hospitals across Canada. I tried to get into the OR here at St. Paul’s but at that time they were over staffed. A friend recommended taking the Medical Device Reprocessing (MDR) course (we used to do a lot of the MDR work in the OR before it became an entity unto itself) and I was hired on at SPH eight years ago now.

Recruitment sounds like a multi-faceted role — what all is involved in your day-to-day?