Editorial
Long-term care homes play community role
Friday, November 17, 2006
While caring for society’s elderly in a
supportive and dignified fashion is their utmost
purpose, long-term care homes serve a broader
community role, particularly in rural Ontario.
In the small community of Long Sault, local seniors
venture to their area nursing home to receive
their flu shot instead of making the trip to Cornwall.
In the municipality of Brighton, people using
pacemakers stop in at their neighbourhood long-term
care home to get a pacemaker check.
In many communities, high school students descend
on nursing homes for co-op placements or community
service hours. It is here they dissolve their
fear of nursing homes and gain a respect for their
elders. In some cases, students go on to pursue
education to become the next generation of caregivers
for this country’s growing population of
seniors.
Particularly in small communities, the long-term
care home is a part of its identity. In Easton’s
Corners-Jasper where Rosebridge Manor is located,
the long-term care home is the area’s largest
employer.
Closing a long-term care home not only uproots
residents and staff but destroys a host of community
connections as well.
The Province is proposing a new Long Term Care
Homes Act that would put a 10-year deadline on
nursing home’s operating licences and provide
no plan for what happens before or after that.
If the Act is passed, after seven years the government
can decide to do anything it wants with the older
homes, including close them and move the beds
to another community.
Without a funding commitment for the structural
renewal of older homes, current and future residents
could face uncertainty for the next decade.
A ray of hope however came in the form of a Private
Member’s motion Nov. 23. All three provincial
political parties voted unanimously in the legislature
in favour of the motion by Kitchener-Waterloo
MPP Elizabeth Witmer calling on government to
commit to a plan of action to invest in the upgrading
of older B and C classified long-term care homes.
Meanwhile, an Ontario Long Term Care Association
advocacy campaign continues at homes across Ontario.
The pressure is now on the government to follow
through with the motion the three parties supported.
“To close our home and move people out –
it would be devastating,” says Rick Gourlie,
administrator of Almonte Country Haven.
While the immediate concern is stability for residents
and staff, the government shouldn’t look
past the vaster role nursing homes serve.
With Almonte Country Haven being a part of its
community for nearly 30 years, service clubs and
churches have come to support the nursing home
in the town of 4,600 people, located 50 kilometres
from the nation’s capital.
The administrator points to the involvement of
the local Civitan and other service clubs and
the support of the church community.
“It’s called community inclusion.
When you have community inclusion you have stability.”
Should the government approve the Act as it reads
now without taking action to invest in capital
renewal of older homes, it could potentially result
in the closure of these important community centres
and ultimately unravel part of the fabric that
binds Ontario’s small towns.
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