Jamie Daw drew a 70km-wide radius on a map this week to show her mother how far she would have to drive to visit her ailing husband if he moved to a nursing home not of his choice under a new provincial law.
Daw’s father is 93 and has had so many falls that he is no longer welcome in the Simcoe, Ont., nursing home.  He has been in Norfolk General Hospital since June after a bad fall, followed by contracting COVID-19 while recovering.
Dementia has started to set in and he has been on a waiting list to enter one of five local long-term care homes for more than a year.  But new rules unveiled this week mean he can be moved to a nursing home much further away.
“It already felt like there was very little control, and now we feel like we’re at the mercy of the system and we’re going to be sent wherever we’re sent regardless of what we want,” Daw said in an interview Thursday.
Daw’s 71-year-old mother is currently a two-minute drive from the hospital where her husband lives, and his five preferred nursing homes are all nearby, Daw said.
Daw showed her mother that her father could be sent as far as Hamilton, London, Ont., or Kitchener, Ont.
“Hamilton is a bigger city and it’s not easy to drive small-towners,” he said.  “And taking someone out of their community — there’s a good chance my dad knows people in the houses on our list — and disrupting that sense of belonging is going to be difficult, if it happens.”
The province unveiled rules Wednesday that allow hospitals to temporarily send discharged patients waiting for a long-term care position to nursing homes not of their choice up to 70 kilometers away in southern Ontario and up to 150 kilometers away in northern territories on a temporary basis.  charges $400 per day if they refuse.
The province said the law behind the rules, passed last month, is part of its efforts to ease pressure on hospitals that have closed emergency departments for periods of time and a huge backlog of surgeries.
Patients like Daw will remain on the priority list for their preferred homes.
The law has sparked outrage among seniors and advocates.
For Cecily White, the new law has caused real concern about where her 81-year-old sister will end up once she is ready to leave hospital.
Diane Marshall is in a hospital in Brockville, Ont., with a gallbladder problem, White said.  This issue, compounded by her existing poor kidney function and fibromyalgia, means her recovery will not be easy and surgery, if it does happen, will be complicated.
Marshall will likely need help wherever she ends up going after the hospital — her 83-year-old husband has serious heart problems and is limited in how much he can support his wife, White said.
Recovery in a long-term care home is on the table, White said, especially if surgery is required, but new rules outlined by the province this week have Marshall’s family worried about what the future holds.
“We’re terrified right now, we feel powerless,” White said in an interview.
She said her sister has been in hospital since Sunday after her husband called an ambulance.  The family hopes he will recover enough to go home, but the future is uncertain.
“If she was sent away from her husband to recover in a nursing home, they would be devastated,” said White, who lives in Ajax, Ont.  “You would have two people ready to give up their lives and that’s why this new law is tough.”
White, 71, said she herself is healthy and walks five to seven kilometers a day, but realized she was falling badly after being sent to the hospital.
“I’ve done a few face plants, I’m known for being clumsy, but now I’m thinking, do I want to risk going to the hospital if I don’t know where I’m going to end up?”  he said.  “These thoughts are on my mind now.”
New rules on how far patients can be moved come into force on Wednesday next week, with hospitals required to charge patients who refuse from 20 November.
The government said the distances patients travel will be calculated based on their preferred home location.
The regulations apply to hospital patients deemed by doctors to need an “alternative level of care”, who have been placed on a waiting list to enter a long-term care home.  The province said there are about 1,800 such patients across the province.
The new rules will help free up at least 250 hospital beds in the first six months, the province said.
Patricia Spindel, the co-founder of Seniors for Social Action, said the new law amounts to financial coercion to force patients into facilities they don’t want to go to.
“They’re using the club of a law to try to force us into these facilities, and that’s a violation of their human rights,” Spindel said.  “This is targeting the weakest and most vulnerable people in Ontario and this is bullying behavior.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published on September 15, 2022.