A little kindness goes a long way

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This article was published 17/03/2022 (917 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Three months after she was transferred to a hospital 350 kilometres from home without follow-up care, an 80-year-old Winnipegger is back in the city receiving geriatric rehab.

Joan Hodgson’s return happened after the local community rallied around her and health-care leadership pledged to do better.

In late December, Hodgson went to Concordia Hospital for a broken leg. On Jan. 12, she was transferred to Russell Health Centre, as part of Manitoba’s inter-regional transfer protocol to free up space for COVID-19 patients.

Hodgson was one of more than 300 to be transferred. Then her son and primary caregiver died while she was in hospital and she had no visitors.

On March 12, she was airlifted to Deer Lodge Centre — but not before the kindness of strangers set her on a hopeful path.

“Those last few days in Russell, it was like she was a different person, because she suddenly had this community around going, ‘Hey, we heard about you, we’re worried about you and we’re going to see if you’re OK.’ These different ways of reaching out, it was really beautiful. It made a huge difference,” said her daughter, Kate Hodgson, who lives in Vancouver.

Early this month, Kate spoke publicly in the Free Press about her concerns for her mother and other transferred patients, after Hodgson’s scheduled follow-up appointments were repeatedly delayed, which in turn delayed her recovery and ability to go home to friends and loved ones.

Kate filed a complaint with the Winnipeg Regional Health Authority over her mother’s case, and soon after, Hodgson received a referral to Deer Lodge’s geriatric rehabilitation program.

Manitobans heard her story and reached out to the family, wrote letters to politicians, and sent Hodgson gifts. The news of her journey struck a chord with Andrea Glasman, a personal care home worker in Russell who went to visit Hodgson on her own time and helped her video chat with family, whom she hadn’t seen in months.

“Sometimes, something hits you and it kind of pulls at your heart strings. Something was telling me, ‘You have to reach out to (Hodgson’s) daughter,’” Glasman said.

She did, via Facebook, and visited Hodgson twice before the 80-year-old was transferred back to Winnipeg.

“It was very nice,” Glasman said. “I would just hope if I wasn’t available for any of my family, you always hope that there’s some good soul out there that will reach out to them no matter what age, right? In our world the way it is, you just want to show a little love out there instead of turmoil.”

Glasman was reminded of her 100-year-old mother-in-law’s recent experience moving to long-term care. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, her social visits dwindled and could only have contact with Glasman and her husband, her essential caregivers.

“I just know how hard that was on her to not have her people around,” Glasman said, noting many people have similar experiences.

So far, 320 Manitoba patients have been transferred to health centres outside their home region via the province’s inter-regional transfer protocol, which was meant to free up city hospital beds for COVID-19 patients and is expected to continue post-pandemic.

According to Shared Health, as of Friday morning, 105 were actively receiving inpatient care. 

“Care teams at originating sites review the needs of stable patients identified as candidates… and work to match them with receiving sites that can meet both their immediate and ongoing care needs,” a statement from Shared Health said. 

“It is the responsibility of receiving sites to provide and co-ordinate appropriate services for patients once they have arrived and are in their care.” 

That’s part of the problem, Kate said. She’s urging Manitobans to hold leaders accountable for gaps in elder care. After she filed the complaint, Kate said she received an apology from the president of Concordia Hospital.

“The complaints processes helped,” she said. “I think what was most heartening for us was having people say, ‘This is not OK.’”

Kate wants to use her voice to support other families — around 40 others reached out with dozens of similar stories — and urged Manitobans to do the same.

“This was a huge amount of effort, just to get this happening for my mom, and it’s not OK that that’s happening to other people.”

katie.may@freepress.mb.ca