Posted by Sudbury Northern Life
The Memorial hospital site cannot be closed because there is a crisis brewing in the city, said former Mayor Jim Gordon, at city council Wednesday.
It will be needed to house alternative level of care patients
once the new one-site Sudbury Regional Hospital construction is
completed.
The crisis Gordon mentioned involves ALC patients taking up an increasing number of beds at Sudbury Regional Hospital, over 100 on some days.
Because the new one site hospital is going to have even fewer beds, reducing from 527 beds to 429 by March 2010, this means there is no time to waste, said Gordon.
The first plank in solving the crisis is to keep the Memorial Hospital site open, he noted.
"On Monday the ALC steering committee met and we said unanimously that there is no other place to go."
Gordon, the chair of the city's advisory panel on health cluster development, made his final recommendations on addressing the alternative level of care (ALC) bed crisis to city council this week. While in provincial politics, he was parliamentary assistant to two health ministers.
But more serious than the bed shortage at the hospital is the aging population in the city and Northern Ontario in general, said Gordon.
"The northeast is aging faster than any other region in Ontario. In the 2001 census, the proportion of the population 65 years of age and over represented 16.5 per cent versus 13.6 per cent in Southern Ontario."
While there are 90,985 persons aged 65 and older in the region currently, Ontario Ministry of Finance projections show that population increasing by 78 per cent to 162,000 by 2031.
These individuals account for 80 per cent of ALC cases and
the vast majority, 90 per cent, in Sudbury Regional Hospital
are from the city, noted Gordon in his report.
"Demographics are the primary reason for our dilemma."
But there is more involved than just keeping the Memorial Hospital open for ALC patients.
There also needs to be a trained workforce there in the community for the support of the elderly. Gordon outlined many problems that have festered over the years that affects whether or not enough workers can be found and kept for this task:
-Community Care Access Centres have been grossly underfunded for more than a decade, resulting in an erosion of services, until the Liberal government injected new money into them
-workers are underpaid, work split shifts and are not compensated for travel expenses
-cutbacks in services are forcing the remaining caregivers to work in more stressful environments, leading to poor job satisfaction levels
-the numbers of students applying for Cambrian College's personal support worker course is diminishing
-there is a shortage of nurses and the nurses employed are aging themselves
Despite these problems, Gordon said that a made-in-Sudbury solution needs to be developed.
"We have to come up with a 'made-in-Sudbury' home care model, one that fits the needs of our people, one that is seen as an attractive and valued job by the care givers who give our aged the hope and care they deserve."
That model would involve a shift from relying on large institutions to smaller facilities and empower the private sector who already run seniors residences to build more by subsidizing those who cannot afford the fees.
Supporting someone to book into a private facility is cheaper than trying to house them in the hospital, said Gordon.
Coun. Ted Callaghan said supporting seniors to live longer in their homes should appeal to the "bean counters" at the province.
Coun. Frances Caldarelli, a former VON nurse, said there needs to be different services for seniors with various challenges, be they mental or physical.
"I know that in Alberta, home care can involve six or seven seniors with dementia problems in a home with around-the-clock supervision. But here in Ontario we tend to look at big facilities. We need smaller facilities that are more cost-efficient where what is necessary is adequate supervision for these seniors."
Because the city and the northeast is facing the demographic crisis first in the province, and the province knows this, they can be convinced to support a new model developed here, said Gordon.
"The province has an aging at home strategy under development. They have seen the light. The Minister has said to us, come up with a model because they need it themselves. They have none."
Finally, Gordon said that the city has faced challenges before.
"I recall being told we could not ever have a cancer treatment centre. I remember hearing that the city could not get a medical school because there were not enough faculty available. This is not as difficult as those two projects."
Gordon said he received much public input from those in the community who care about the situation during a number of public consultations he held recently.
He applauded the city's initiative to set up a geriatric program at Pioneer Manor this March.
"It is truly leading edge and is going to be a cornerstone tool in getting a handle on our current health-care crisis."
