July 26, 2017
“Every day, I receive heartbreaking phone calls, letters and e-mails from families concerned that their loved ones are not getting the care they need,” said Armstrong. “At Meadow Park, staff work tirelessly to provide excellent care, but chronic understaffing has them run off their feet, and residents are being left without the kind of care that protects their health, their safety and their dignity.”
Jarlette Health Services is seeking to transfer 17 beds from Meadow Park to Southhampton Care Centre and 29 beds to Meadow Park Nursing Home in Chatham. As of June 2017, there were 33 people on the wait list for basic beds at the facility with a wait time of 293 days.
“Conditions at Meadow Park have been allowed to deteriorate because Ontario has no staff-to-resident ratios at long-term care homes and no minimum standards of care governing how often seniors must be offered a bath or how long they can be left in bed,” said Armstrong. “Transferring beds from Meadow Park and out of London does nothing to fix this.
“We need more beds in our community, more staff and more resources for seniors.”
Andrea Horwath and the NDP have called for an inquiry that will shine a light on the problems in seniors care homes so that immediate action can be taken to address them – action the NDP says is long overdue, and that seniors and their families shouldn’t have to wait for.