Reader sees need for better caregivers

Erik Freiburger is a Calgary blogger (atthebottomofthewell.com). He and his spouse are quadriplegics following motorized vehicle accidents in 1992 and 1994. They’ve been underneath Residence Care’s care all through most of their lives.

Let me begin by saying my spouse and I’ve some unimaginable caregivers who take care of us enormously and are immeasurably expert in data and expertise for taking care of our well being wants as quadriplegics right here within the metropolis of Calgary.

We merely couldn’t survive locally with out them.

However, it appears as if this group of caregiving has been drastically shrinking the previous a number of years and culturally altering, with fewer and fewer expert staff. Poorly educated staff who appear to solely care about receiving a paycheque fairly than bringing dignity and care to these with disabilities.

Final June, Alberta Well being Providers introduced the cancellation of their group caregiving contract with a neighborhood well being agency and its renewal with a brand new firm right here in Calgary.

My spouse and I’ve undergone the transition to their companies on the finish of January and it has been an entire nightmare.

For the primary week of care they appeared to easily present up each time they felt prefer it, with none regard to our schedule.

They nonetheless do, as simply this morning the caregiver referred to as at 9:40 a.m. to say they might be right here at 10:00. In the meantime, she’s not speculated to be right here till midday.

We have now referred to as the corporate’s workplace on a number of events to ask if somebody was nonetheless coming. However, like so many instances earlier than, we are able to solely go away telephone messages and nobody ever returns our calls.

Regardless of AHS’ guarantees that our companies wouldn’t change and our requested common caregivers wouldn’t be faraway from our care, each single individual that arrived was fully new — not simply in our care personally however in any care, interval.

To our shock, that they had no understanding of what a Hoyer ground elevate (permits an individual to be lifted and transferred with a minimal of bodily effort) was or find out how to safely function it; together with these within the workplace after we referred to as for additional assist.

In a single such case, after struggling to place the sling on my spouse for quarter-hour (even at first making an attempt to place it on the wrong way up), she stood there staring blankly on the pull-down bar on my fitness center equipment — a chunk of apparatus totally unrelated to the Hoyer ground elevate.

I requested her, “What are you doing?” And in her damaged English she replied, “I’m making an attempt to determine find out how to hook her as much as this bar.”

She was making an attempt to hook up my spouse to a fitness center equipment! I didn’t know whether or not to giggle or scream.

Such is the dearth of professionalism we’re experiencing every day. Like I mentioned, a nightmare.

I’m not naive both as to the struggles confronted by native caregiving corporations right here in Calgary looking for competent staff.

This previous week an article in a neighborhood newspaper highlighted the truth that Calgary misplaced greater than 20,000 health-care and social help staff this previous yr.

Satirically, Edmonton gained about the identical variety of health-care and social help staff. There was no indication as as to whether it was switch development or not nevertheless it raises critical questions.

1. What’s Edmonton doing to recruit health-care staff that Calgary just isn’t?

2. What incentives does Calgary supply to health-care staff to foster longevity of employment?

3. And the way is Calgary vetting and coaching its native caregivers to provide correct care locally?

After all, we introduced our considerations to our AHS Coordinator. However the one different she may supply was a transfer into a non-public and profit-driven health-care system.

Beneath such care, AHS would cowl a portion of the care, whereas the non-public companies then invoice the purchasers by Blue Cross billing.

Most of those companies require a minimal of two to 3 hours per go to leading to an imbalance of purchasers private care wants.

In different phrases… over-billing. However like so many others in a finances acutely aware world, with our income-restricted life we merely can’t afford this.

Based on Canadian Caregiving, “The price of permitting Canada’s caregiving methods to fail is the well-being and even the lives of care recipients, care suppliers and caregivers. Analysis has proven worsened signs and poorer outcomes in care recipients when their caregiver is in misery.”

All I can say is we’d like higher caregivers in Calgary and one thing wants to vary … and alter quick earlier than somebody finally ends up damage or worse.

I shudder to suppose if it already has.