ÎLE-PERROT – Richard Lemieux is back to square one.
When Global News first spoke to him in March, his adapted transportation from his home in Île-Perrot to the Lakeshore General Hospital in Pointe-Claire for dialysis treatments had been cut off.
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The single father received an outpouring of support from the local community, including numerous volunteers who offered to bring him to the hospital.
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“I was getting there through volunteers, but a lot of the volunteers could only do it so long,” said Lemieux.
“I made it very clear to them that when they couldn’t do it any more to let me know.”
Lemieux said his problems are far from over.
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“What happened after that was the volunteer department at the hospital, which has nothing to do with anybody else at the hospital, offered me about a month and a half supply of taxi vouchers,” he explained.
“I received those, I used those and when those were out, the hospital told me there’s nothing else that could be done.”
Since May, he’s been taking the city bus to his treatments – three times a week.
“It has its challenges,” he said.
“It’s not something I’ll be able to do in the winter months when it gets cold.”
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Lemieux has to wheel himself about 15 minutes from his home to a shuttle bus in Île-Perrot.
That bus brings him to Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, where he then travels another 10 minutes to the bus stop near John Abbott College, which then takes him to the hospital.
The whole trip takes about 90 minutes.
“They have some older buses that are not quite adapted properly, they don’t always work right,” explained Lemieux.
“Which leaves me sometimes having to wait for the next bus, and the bus I need to get to the Lakeshore Hospital comes only every 20 minutes, 40 minutes.”
His daughter, Sydney, said she feels guilty when she can’t accompany her father by bus to the hospital.
“When I have to come here and drop him on the bus and I have to get off and go back, I couldn’t feel anymore selfish,” she told Global News.
According to medical malpractice lawyer, Jean-Pierre Ménard, access to healthcare services is the responsibility of the hospital and local health and social service centres (CSSS).
Ménard was one of the people who came forward to help Lemieux in the spring.
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He contacted the Lakeshore Hospital to demand Lemieux’s transportation is restored.
Ménard said he will do what he can to once again help Lemieux.
“We’ll check to see what happened here and what kind of action could we do,” said Ménard.
“It is not acceptable that a citizen be deprived of care.”
Until then, Lemieux and his daughter will continue to stick together and hope for the best.
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