{"id":4083,"date":"2022-05-04T00:03:17","date_gmt":"2022-05-04T04:03:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/?page_id=4083"},"modified":"2022-05-04T00:03:45","modified_gmt":"2022-05-04T04:03:45","slug":"the-cost-of-freedom-to-care","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/?page_id=4083","title":{"rendered":"The Cost of Freedom to Care"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bacon Scrapins<\/em><\/strong> \u2013 \u201c<\/strong>The Cost of Freedom to Care!\u201d<\/h3>\n

by Barry S. Wolfe<\/p>\n

Bacon Scrapins<\/em><\/strong> are the little bits of meat left in the greasy fry pan. They\u2019re tasty, but the \u2018nutrition\u2019 needs searching for. This tale is a bacon scrapin<\/em><\/strong>.<\/h5>\n

\u201cDid you see that the province announced that it was increasing how much it\u2019s putting toward Long-Term Care homes?\u201d<\/p>\n

Dan, my neighbour and walking buddy, and I were strolling along on one of our regular walks around our \u20189-stop-signs\u2019 sized community.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes. I saw it the first time they announced it last October.\u201d I replied. \u201cIt\u2019s great news, even if it is old news. This time it\u2019s pre-election media saturation, but it is still terrific that they are taking some of the $16.7 billion they get in Canada Health Transfers this year and are putting it to excellent use.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIs it your sister who\u2019s in a LTC home?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes. There are 626 licensed homes in Ontario, 58% are private for profit, 24% are non-profit\/charitable and 16% are municipal. My sister\u2019s in a municipal home.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s younger than you, isn\u2019t she? Why is she there?\u201d he probed.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s almost 7 years younger. She had a \u2018difficult\u2019 forceps birth, and now has multiple needs \u2013 intellectual and physical, including Parkinson\u2019s which now puts her into a wheelchair and it\u2019s hard to understand her speech. She lived at home, all her life, right up until our mother physically and emotionally couldn\u2019t provide care anymore. Our mother, ironically, ended up living in the same long-term care home, so the two were still together until mom died.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow is the level of care?\u201d he worried.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe staff are superb. Every one of those who work with her know and \u2018love\u2019 her, can joke with her, are patient and consoling when she screams out in frustration. They use a special lift to get her to toileting, perform all the sanitary diaper changes, rub cream into any chaffing areas, help dress her, feed her individually, give limited physical exercise, and try to keep her occupied. The last two have been challenges for them.\u201d I noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cKeep her occupied? Doesn\u2019t she keep herself occupied? he wondered.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo. There are tens of thousands of residents in these Ontario homes. There are not enough staff to meet all of their needs. My sister has had Parkinson\u2019s for over 30 years. She\u2019s only 67 and much younger than other residents in the home. She doesn\u2019t sit in front of a TV all day. She doesn\u2019t have a long attention span \u2013 so puzzles are hard. She wheels herself around the home and used to get into the kitchen and steal applesauce out of the huge jars. She often gets the chair caught up against a wall because she can\u2019t wheel herself straight due to Parkinson\u2019s. She gets frustrated and starts screaming for attention. She can\u2019t help it. She\u2019s got major challenges.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI can see why she has to be in special care. What did you do?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause the home didn\u2019t have enough staff, and couldn\u2019t provide enough hours she needed, they were getting frustrated. As her Power of Attorney, I spent months researching and investigating supports. \u00a0I eventually found the Ontario Disability Support Program. I figured out the bureaucratic processes, completed a lot of paperwork, and applied for a special grant for her. We had to get special diagnostic assessments by medical specialists, and psychologists, to submit. Because of her specialized needs we were successful, and I have contracted with a non-profit social services organization to provide additional support time for her – and the home – and to manage the funding legalities.\u00a0 When she turned 65, the provincial program funding ended, so I applied for an increase in her federal pensions to cover the lost income. So, with federal and provincial money, they\u2019re doing an adequate job of trying to meet her individual needs. But, it\u2019s hard to get qualified help. There is a lot of turnover of staff.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause the long-term care homes and provincially funded support contractors don\u2019t pay enough, nor provide benefits. These excellent people are being hired away by school boards who also desperately need qualified support staff. Public school boards have union negotiated contracts and thus provide a living wage with benefits.\u201d I said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is the answer?\u201d Dan asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe province needs to match the grants to LTC homes with the school boards\u2019 grants. Provide all<\/em> care givers with a living wage and benefits. I\u2019m thankful that our family does not have to care for her, as it would be impossible. I\u2019m thankful that the federal government and province are putting in as much as they do. We are fortunate to live in Canada, and have the freedom from some responsibilities to provide for all our various cares individually. But, like everything, it\u2019s still not enough money.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThankfully, I\u2019m in good health. I guess we have to decide how much we care \u2013 in dollars.\u201d Dan commented.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a tendency for folks who don\u2019t need services like cancer treatment or long-term residential care to take that \u2018freedom from concern\u2019 for granted, until they need it themselves. Some want to be free of their social responsibilities to their fellows entirely.\u201d I opined.<\/p>\n

\u201cYup. \u2018Freedom isn\u2019t free!\u2019 In the big picture, I think my complaints are really petty at this time of year \u2013 tax filing time!\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n

We walked on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bacon Scrapins \u2013 \u201cThe Cost of Freedom to Care!\u201d by Barry S. Wolfe Bacon Scrapins are the little bits of meat left in the greasy fry pan. They\u2019re tasty, but the \u2018nutrition\u2019 needs searching for. This tale is a bacon scrapin. \u201cDid you see that the province announced that it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":4072,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4083","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4083"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4083\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4084,"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4083\/revisions\/4084"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisiswilmot.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}