Ottawa area wait times hit provincial high for long term care facilities
Posted Jul 29, 2010 By Katie Stewart
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Tweet ThisEMC News - Seniors in Ottawa are waiting longer to enter long-term care (LTC) facilities than any other area in the province.
According to the Ontario Health Quality Council report for 2010, the median number of days for LTC home placement in the Champlain region is 237, close to eight months.
The provincial average is 105 days.
Since 2005, wait times have tripled in Ontario, leaving many seniors, hospitals, and families worried about when, if ever, they will be able to enter the ministry funded homes.
"Everybody is in the same boat," said Kevin Babulic, director of client services at the Champlain Community Care Access Centre (CCAC). "The numbers are significantly high everywhere."
According to David Jensen, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Health and Long-term Care, the government has opened 8,384 new long-term care beds since 2003. However, according to Karen Nelson, chief of social work at The Ottawa Hospital, Ottawa faces these longer wait times for a few different reasons.
"The last large opening of beds was in 2005. We haven't been opening enough and many other communities built more LTC beds in the last few years," she said.
There is also a lack of supportive housing for seniors, according to Ms. Nelson.
"Many seniors don't need to live in long term care but can't live alone and many cannot afford retirement homes."
The ministry has said it plans to open 1,590 LTC beds over the next few years, however, looking at the current waitlists just in Ottawa, critics say that won't be nearly enough.
Derrick Gullage, the executive director for The Salvation Army Grace Manor, said they currently have 600 names on their waiting list.
"On average, we have 35 residents that pass in a year. And with the high demand, we just can't keep up," he said.
Linda Chaplin, executive director of St. Patrick's Home, said she has 398 people on the wait list and the reality is that a large number will never make it there.
"We are a non-for-profit and many people choose us as a first choice because we are faith based and have strong Catholic values," she said. "But most of the time, people don't get their first choice."
Ms. Chaplin said that 98% of admissions are people from hospitals, because many assessments done by CCAC show that seniors living in the community are medically stable enough to continue living in their home.
However, this becomes a large strain on many caretakers and family members.
Ms. Chaplin said she gets phone calls regularly asking where loved ones are on the list. However, because the lists work in a priority sequence based on assessments, the lists constantly change.
These long wait times put a large strain on hospitals, as seniors aren't well enough to leave and have to wait in hospital until a bed becomes available.
"We weren't at all surprised by these numbers. It is very well known," said Ms. Nelson.
She explained that many seniors who enter the hospital haven't made plans for long-term care before they arrive, because they quite simply never needed to.
But once they enter, they often aren't medically stable enough to go back to their homes. So the hospital becomes a transition point, as they wait for an opening.
"The number of beds available in long-term care facilities is not equal to the number needed," said Ms. Nelson. "Fifteen per cent of beds are out of circulation because of seniors waiting for long-term care."
These occupied hospital beds that could be used for other purposed can lead to delays in emergency rooms or cancelled surgeries.
To try to solve the issue that may only get worse as the baby boomer generation gets older, the ministry has an Aging at Home strategy, which is investing $1.1 billion over four years to give seniors and their caregivers an integrated continuum of community based services so seniors can stay healthy and live more independently and in their homes for longer.
"While we thought that long term care would be a good solution, we now have to look for sustainable and quality ways to assist the generation that is coming up," said Mr. Babulic. "In the next couple of months, the LHIN (local health integrated network) will be focusing on some alternatives for people who need assistance but who don't require long term care. We'll be looking for successes in other jurisdictions."
Mr. Babuilic mentioned things like home support resources and supportive housing as some of the possible options.
"Trying to establish supportive housing to try and bridge the gap and more service to people who return home after hospital could be beneficial and take some great burden off families," said Ms. Nelson.
"We don't have enough alternatives," said Ms. Chaplin, who said that having a case manager that could monitor someone's health in the home might be helpful to seniors.
However, she also pointed out that the upcoming generations are living longer and are focusing more on health promotion and prevention.
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