The
news today has been full of stories on the new Seniors Action Plan to be implemented
by the BC Government. A story
in the Globe and Mail stated: Advocate
Health
Minister Mike de Jong outlined a series of tragic incidents involving senior
care in British Columbia in recent years, assuring families that he's heard
them and promising fundamental changes Tuesday.
Mr. De
Jong mentioned the elderly Sidney man forced to fight to win back the thousands
of dollars he deposited with a care home for his wife who died before she moved
in.
He spoke
about the Penticton couple, together for 60 years, who were separated due to
their differing health needs.
He
mentioned the North Vancouver man with dementia who choked to death while being
fed by a caregiver, and “the situation confronted by a 71-year-old man found
weighing 59 pounds in a Penticton motel.”
Mr. De
Jong said the B.C. seniors care action plan he announced was partly in reaction
to a sweeping report by Ombudsperson Kim Carter and its 176 recommendations,
but it is also the government's long-awaited plan to provide dignity to the
lives of the province's elderly people.
“We do want to tackle the themes that have
come up again and again. I’ve mentioned a few of them. We want to lay
out via this action plan a blueprint for fundamental change.”
Mr. De
Jong said the government will focus on six areas of change, which include
establishing a seniors advocate to ensure a more accessible and transparent
approach to seniors care in British Columbia.
If you
care to have a read, a Summary Report by BC Ombudsperson Kim Carter can be read
by CLICKING
HERE
The
action plan, Improving Care for BC Seniors, released by Health Minister Mike de
Jong, can be read by CLICKING
HERE
MEANTIME
… other stories in the news indicate:
… A homeless patient has spent more than 470 days at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital at a cost of more than $700,000 because there isn’t a suitable place that can serve as her new home
… over 50 per cent of elderly patients in
British Columbia residential-care facilities were prescribed anti-psychotic
drugs over a two-month period last year … the most commonly used anti-psychotic
drugs were “atypical” medications – drugs developed over the past few decades
that have been linked to serious side effects, including strokes and heart
attacks, and that Health Canada in 2005 said were not approved for use in
elderly people with dementia
… Seniors in need of an assessment to
determine what kind of subsidized care they require are waiting significantly
longer than the two-week guideline established by the province … the average
waiting time for such an assessment in the Northern Health Authority in 2010-11
was 205 days …
… 20 years ago, voices said that money and
plans were needed within a decade to cope with the increased health-care
demands of the growing number of seniors … we saw no effective plans in BC and
only cuts under the Campbell government.
The government claims that the $2.5 billion spent on home care and
health care for seniors this year is a 60% increase over 2001 … it indicates
something is drastically wrong with this government's policy on health care for
seniors if they have spent that much money and we get Carter's disturbing two part
report ...
… the programs they [government] have work,
but the seniors that most need them have a difficult time accessing them. It’s
a combination of pride and not knowing … many residents are in their 70s and
80s, it’s difficult for many to get around … they could benefit from a
government representative going directly to them to explain the programs that
could help … report noted approximately 70 per cent of seniors over the age of
80 in B.C. have never been assessed for home and community care services.
Hopefully
these long awaited changes can bring about real positive change for BC’s
seniors. They've been twenty years coming!
I’m
Alan Forseth in Kamloops
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