First of all, I would like to start out by commending MLA Jason Nixon and the community of Sundre for attending the meeting held Monday, March 21 regarding the long-term care (LTC) unit closing at the hospital.
Next, at no time do I intend to downplay the beautiful new facility in Sundre built by Mountain View Seniors' Housing (MVSH). It is a fantastic building that will provide opportunities to many seniors in our area.
My reason for writing lies solely in the complaint that while we gain in some resident living spaces, we ultimately lose when any service such as long-term care is closed in a community. We have been led down a path of a hidden agenda and did not become aware of it until Monday, March 7 when Alberta Health Services made this announcement at our hospital.
What concerns me even more is the lack of consultation that took place with any board, group or community member in this decision process. I now have personally attended four meetings in Sundre, all of which had AHS representatives, but I still have not received an answer to many questions, including what will be happening in the soon-to-be-empty space where LTC once resided.
Perhaps if a long-term plan was proposed to our citizens of future plans we could rest easy. But with no plans in place, it leads us only to speculation of how capacity of our hospital might change.
On a personal level, I have a family member who will be moved to the new facility. I can assure you that the consultations promised with family members did not occur as outlined in previous articles by both Cathy McDonald or our Health Minister Sarah Hoffman. Both had stated that AHS would be committed in working with each resident and family, and we were told on a personal level that families and patients would be involved in the decision-making process.
Only a few days later we received a call from the hospital giving us basically 24 hours' notice of when our family member's meeting would take place. After calling back and explaining we could not attend that quickly due to work commitments, they did agree to reschedule the meeting, and we were told our dad's evaluation had already taken place and a decision was made on his placement already.
If this is how AHS consults with people, they need a quick lesson on what a consultation process really is. We have been told repeatedly by AHS that we are gaining beds in Sundre. I don't care how many numbers are thrown at us, or how they are presented ó they are decommissioning 15 LTC beds in our town under a government that campaigned on the promise to open 2,000 LTC beds in Alberta.
I understand that not all current residents of the Sundre LTC require that level of care; many will slide into the new facility with no issues. Sadly, I also think that a few do require true LTC and are being downgraded medically to fit into MVSH to quiet a few people down.
In this transition, our hospital will be losing approximately 38 front-line workers as none are promised work in the new facility. AHS has also downplayed that by stating that staff is ensured jobs in our area. After Googling the AUPE website, I have discovered that the collective bargaining agreement actually states that employees basically will be offered jobs within a 100-kilometre radius (if the job openings exist) only. This does not make me rest easy that we are not seeing a huge job loss in our community during these already hard economic times.
We can almost be assured that when no one presents a plan to the public after numerous requests, they have a plan that they do not want us to be aware of. I am proud to come from a community that has had outstanding citizens in our past who worked tirelessly on issues such as building a hospital in our town. It is our job as a community to not allow the two steps forward, one step back approach to be accepted.
We owe it to our parents, grandparents, community builders and leaders of the past to stand up and fight for all services in our town hospital.
Barb Jackson
Sundre
