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This week, the Sask. Party government introduced a bill that would add teeth to the current regulations for personal care homes in the province, however an advocate doesn’t believe that will do much.
The Personal Care Homes (Safer Homes for Seniors) Amendment Act was introduced on Thursday. According to the provincial government, it will strengthen oversight of personal care homes by allowing the Ministry of Health to issue orders requiring homes to follow the regulations and to levy fines.
The ministry already oversees personal care homes, inspecting the homes regularly, with the ability to suspend licenses or pursue legal action.
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The new legislation would allow the ministry to issue compliance orders and issue fines of $5,000 plus an additional $1,000 per day if a problem persists.
It would also raise the fines if the home operator commits an offence — from $1,000 to $10,000, and more for each day it continues. A corporation would see a fine increase from $5,000 to $25,000.
Anita Bouvier has owned three personal care homes and currently owns Senior Care Compass which does training for home operators and workers.
She doesn’t believe the government’s changes will be enough.
“I feel just adding a penalty to the existing regulations isn’t going to make much of a difference, I would have liked to have seen the regulations themselves change,” said Bouvier.
She wants the government to increase the required education, saying the current two days of training aren’t enough.
“Which certainly doesn’t leave me the confidence that the care workers would be qualified to do the care that’s being required right now of personal care homes,” she said.
Bouvier explained that, since there is a shortage in long-term care beds and hospital beds in the province, people with higher needs are going into personal care homes, and many of those owners and workers aren’t equipped for it.
She said just adding penalties for violating the current regulations won’t do much to increase the quality of life for seniors in the homes.
Bouvier would like to see at least six weeks of training be the requirement in the province.
She hopes the change will be a positive and that it means the provincial government is listening and taking a closer look at the personal care home situation.
Sask Seniors Minister Lori Carr. (Lisa Schick/980 CJME)
Seniors Minister Lori Carr said the government will try to work in cooperation with a home first, giving the example of a client who has mobility issues and needs to move to a ground floor room.
“The vast majority of times, facilities will work with the family and that loved one will get moved. But if it doesn’t, then we can put administrative penalties in place through this legislation to make that happen,” said Carr.
The minister said they did consultations with personal care homes before making the change, and while they might not have liked it she said they understood this has to happen.
She believes families will be happy with the moves.
“It gives them one more, I guess, tool in their toolbox when they see something happening that’s not getting action; they know that they can take it to another step,” said Carr.
Saskatchewan has 237 licensed personal care homes with more than 4,700 beds.
