Skip to content

OPINION: When care is doled out in precious minutes

It is seldom easy to entrust a loved one’s care to others. Whether it’s a daycare or a seniors facility, the fact is that the most vulnerable young and old among us are often unable to tell us if they are being neglected.
It is seldom easy to entrust a loved one’s care to others. 
 
Whether it’s a daycare or a seniors facility, the fact is that the most vulnerable young and old among us are often unable to tell us if they are being neglected. One can only hope that when one is not personally there to watch over them that someone is doing what they should for our loved ones. Sadly, that is not always the case.
 
Take our story detailing one family’s experiences at the George Derby Care Centre in Burnaby.
 
Joan Hoffman’s family was rightly concerned when they discovered their mother was being left in soiled clothes, missing her medicine doses and, eventually, wandered away from the centre when a door was left unlocked.
 
The family has since moved their mother to a White Rock facility but felt duty bound to tell their story so others may be aware.
 
The centre was in our headlines last year when the facility management decided to lay off longtime nurses and care aides and replace them with contracted-out staff. 
 
The management said they did this reluctantly and only because they couldn’t afford the higher wages. They had fought for a different funding formula from Fraser Health, but did not succeed.
 
The executive director of the George Derby Centre Society says the change has not impacted care at the facility. He says: “The care level has been consistent and if not better.”
 
B.C. seniors’ advocate Isobel Mackenzie recently released a major report on seniors in residential care in B.C. 
 
The report found staffing levels were a major concern of almost 10,000 seniors and family members who responded to a survey.
 
Mackenzie said: “While staff overall are caring and respectful, consistent feedback is that there simply are not enough staff to ensure residents’ needs are taken care of when they need to be.”
 
An earlier report found 91 per cent of care homes in B.C. failed to meet the Ministry of Health’s staffing guideline of 3.36 hours of care per senior per day in 2015/16. George Derby had 2.87 direct-care hours per patient per day.
 
This simply isn’t good enough in Burnaby or anywhere in B.C.
 
The Hoffman family and many others, we believe, would agree.