When the Progressive Conservative government cut hospital beds by 5,000 and budgets by $1.5 billion resources were to be provided for care in the home.
When that care did not materialize, managers of homecare agencies complained loudly that they did not have enough resources to provide the care with all of the patient’s discharged early from hospital.The Progressive Conservatives responded by taking over all of the boards and put in their own administrators.
Then the province introduced the competitive bidding model, with the community care access centres tendering for and buying homecare services.

Caring for those who need care

Staff at Fairhaven can meet provincial standards, but many would love to do more with a little more time

(PETERBOROUGH) There are times when there simply isn't time.

The time to listen or help a resident make it to the washroom. The time needed to take a personal touch to a clinical job.

The staff at Fairhaven don't simply aim to keep residents alive by meeting provincial regulations: many strive to ensure those in care really are cared for.

Working faster isn't enough: it's evident to many that more staff would help.

"You don't always leave your job with a good feeling," says Andrea Legault, a personal support worker at Fairhaven and head of the union representing Fairhaven employees -- Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 131. ...read more

Homecare Privatization in Crisis

Compulsory contracting out of homecare services was introduced by the Mike Harris Conservative government in the mid-1990s. Unlike public hospitals, which directly provide health care services, Community Care Access Centres (CCACs) are required to contract out homecare services. This was part of a drive by transnational corporations to skim profits from public health care dollars, a drive that has now moved into other health care sectors...read more

Some vegetative patients show awareness - CBC News

2010-02-04

Scientists have detected glimmers of awareness in some vegetative brain-injury patients and have even communicated with one of them — findings that push the boundaries of how to assess and care for such people.

The new research suggests that standard tests may overlook patients who have some consciousness, and that someday some kind of communication may be possible.

In the strongest example, a 29-year-old patient was able to answer yes-or-no questions by visualizing specific scenes the doctors asked him to imagine. The two visualizations sparked different brain activity viewed through a scanning machine.

"We were stunned when this happened," said one study author, Martin Monti of Medical Research Council Cognitive and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge, England. ...read more

College expansion gets funding from council

Carleton Place offers support for Perth campus. Campus will feature PSW program.
2010-02-04

LANARK COUNTY – Carleton Place town councillors feel so strongly about local post-secondary education, they’re willing to put their money on it.

On Jan. 26, the town agreed to contribute $10,000 over five years to the Algonquin College expansion of the Perth campus.

Representatives from Algonquin College approached the Town of Carleton Place in late January in hopes of gaining some financial support for the project.

At the end of May 2009, Jim Watson and MP Scott Reid announced contributions under the Knowledge Infrastructure Program.

The project will cost an estimated $10 million, with $4.2 million from the federal government and $4.8 million from the provincial government. ...read more

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