Access, levels of care, and planning are just some of the issues highlighted in the recent Ontario Health Coalition report called ‘Situation Critical.’
Tied to levels of care is an escalation of violence in long-term care facilities.
The provincial report used information from the Ontario Coroner information to establish there were 27 resident-on-resident homicides from 2012 to 2016.
On Tuesday morning, the Kingston Health Coalition held a media conference about the provincial report with a panel consisting of health-care workers, residents with family in long-term care, and support groups.
Matthew Gventer, with the Kingston Health Coalition, says from the information he’s been able to gather, there have been no homicides in Kingston.
Gventer looked at inspection reports at 10 Kingston long-term care facilities that he found on the Ministry of Health website.
The reports were from 2017 and 2018.
Gventer says the inspection reports cover just 1,500 beds in Kingston.
“I counted 25 cases of physical abuse by one resident against another, 18 of which were of a sexual nature.”
Gventer points out these are allegations and there was no information on how many of the incidents were confirmed.
Gventer also found only two incidents of resident abuse of staff.
Faye Bolden, a personal support worker (PSW) who sat on the panel, says abuse on staff is under-reported.
“Statistics for PSWs was over 200 in 2018. I have the stats and like I said, that is unreported, that can be just struck, pinched, pulled, spat, hit, kicked — it’s a daily occurrence.”
The coalition report offers four recommendations to address issues ranging from access to mitigating the issues of aggressive behaviour.
It says there should be a regulated minimum average of four hours of daily hands-on direct nursing and personal support for every resident.
The report says that would provide the necessary care necessary and protect residents from harm.
A plan should be developed and implemented to increase the number of long-term care beds in the province, in the public and non-profit sectors.
The third recommendation is a cessation of public hospital downsizing.
The authors of the report claim that will end the offloading of complex patients into long-term care.
The final recommendation is long-term care homes should all have Behavioural Supports Ontario teams.
Those teams are specialized in dealing with the many cognitive issues many residents have.