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Registered nurse Jacki Capper says not being able to provide proper care to patients is an everyday occurrence for workers in her field, and one that takes a heavy emotional toll.

“You almost get despondent,” she said. “We came into the profession to help, and when you can’t do that anymore you think, ‘Why am I doing this?'”

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The phenomenon Capper describes is known as moral distress — the feeling care providers get when they know what a patient needs, but due to a lack of time and/or resources, can’t give it to them.

However, Alberta Health Services says increasing reports of moral distress in the province don’t present a problem.

“There’s definitely times when nurses may not have a piece of equipment that they need at that particular type of moment, and that may cause them to have some anxiety around that or something like that. But I don’t think it’s widespread,” said Linda Dempster, Alberta Health Services’ vice-president of collaborative practice, nursing and health professions.

“I think there’s lots of things that we’re doing to mitigate the risks around that.”

The statement comes after a University of Lethbridge study released this summer found three-quarters of dementia care nurses in southern Alberta frequently experience moral distress, and one month after reports that more regulated nurses left the profession than entered it in 2014.