By Marco Chown Oved, Toronto Star, December 19, 2014
Centre says it can’t provide proper care for resident, who has reluctantly agreed to find new residence.
It’s a sad byproduct of longevity. Like many who have made it to her age, 94-yearold Marie Sparrow has outlived her entire family: first her husband, then her sons, and finally her grandson and niece.
Sparrow has made a few friends at her Mississauga retirement home. Just weeks before Christmas, however, she was asked to move out and warned she’d be sent to hospital if she didn’t comply.
“I could take it if I was a little younger, but I’m 94,” she said. “Instead of going somewhere else and getting to know people again, I’d like to stay here.”
Amica residence at Erin Mills issued a letter to Sparrow this week documenting a meeting between staff, Sparrow and Maria Silva, a friend who holds her legal power of attorney. Amica staff informed Sparrow that the residence “was not a suitable place for you to receive the care necessary for you to flourish.
“Ms. Silva was advised in the meeting that an acceptable transition plan had to be in place by Friday, December 12. If this did not happen, we would consider alternative measures which include sending you to Credit Valley Hospital,” the letter stated.
Amica’s regional operations manager Kieran Hess now calls those “some poorly chosen words.”
“We don’t have the right to evict someone in five days, and we wouldn’t do that,” Hess said. “There’s probably some degree of misinterpretation there.”
In spite of the crossed wires, Sparrow agreed to move out. Resigned to her fate, she sat hunched in her wheelchair as movers bagged up her linens and wheeled out her mattress.
She’s headed to a much more expensive home until she can find a more permanent solution.
Hess said he could not discuss Sparrow’s case specifically due to privacy concerns, but outlined the company’s procedures.
“There are only certain types of care that we are equipped and staffed to manage. And beyond that it often becomes a danger to a specific resident…. Generally, when we feel like we can’t meet those needs, we begin a dialogue with the resident, the resident’s family or their power of attorney to come to an appropriate transition.”
Hess says that evictions are very rare and that he has never had to evict someone during his time with Amica.
“If there was a health issue that warranted somebody needing to go to hospital to be safe in the environment, we might take that measure. Certainly, we don’t put people on the streets,” he said. “It’s not in our best interest to get people out of our building; it’s actually in our best interest to keep people in our buildings when it’s safe.
“The worst thing that can happen for us is for people to leave unhappy.”
Sparrow wore a brave face when the Star arrived for a visit. She had neatly combed her hair and donned a flowered shirt and crisply ironed slacks for the trip. But once she started to reminisce about the old times, her wise blue eyes lit up. During the Second World War, her husband, Bill, was riding in a jeep when it struck a landmine.
“The other three chaps were killed but my husband was thrown out and shattered both his legs,” said Sparrow.
Bill spent years recuperating in hospital. He had one leg amputated and wore a brace on the other that ran from his heel to his hip.
Because he couldn’t work, they moved in with his sister and ended up getting featured a 1951 Montreal Star article about the difficulties faced by returning veterans.
“They put us on the third page. I still have the picture,” she said.
After the article, boxes of groceries started arriving at the house from concerned readers. One anonymous philanthropist even sent over a fur coat.
“I thought: ‘Wow, you get your name in the paper and people do so many nice things for you,’” said Sparrow.
Neighbours started a drive, and soon after the article ran, they raised enough money to buy Bill a hand-controlled Oldsmobile. He started work at Royal Typewriters; they had two sons, Bill Jr. and Bobby; things were looking up.
But Bill died of a heart attack when he was only 49 and Sparrow raised her kids alone, taking a job at Sun Life to support them. Then Bill Jr., who became an elevator mechanic, died of a stroke at 48 and Bobby died of a heart attack when he was 51.
Sparrow’s grandson Richard begged her to move back to Montreal to be close to him, but before she had a chance, he died of a stroke. He was 49. The only person she had left was Cynthia, her niece, who passed away in 2011.
Sparrow moved into Amica Erin Mills in July 2013, and while she thought it was “too fancy” at first, grew to like the comfort and the companionship. She hired a personal support worker to come in for eight hours every day and also has a public Community Care Access Centre nurse for an additional four hours. While she has some mobility difficulties and is a little hard of hearing, Sparrow is still razor-sharp.
Her power of attorney, Maria Silva, says the residence started to pressure her to move Sparrow out after a trip to the hospital in November.
“They didn’t want her any more, but her condition has not changed. There’s no reason why she has to leave. She pays for her own care; the residence doesn’t have any extra responsibilities,” Silva said.
In several discussions with Amica staff, Silva says the reason Sparrow had to leave kept changing. First, her poor mobility made her a fire hazard, then it was that they didn’t have the resources to care for her. “I felt pushed. They told me they’d call the police to take her to the hospital because she doesn’t belong here,” Silva said.
At a sit-down meeting earlier this month, Silva says, she was given five days to get Sparrow out. She demanded that this be put in writing and was given a letter “to acknowledge your move-out date.”
“This wasn’t how the meeting happened. I gave it back to them and told them to put exactly what they told me in the letter,” Silva said.
A second letter was more precise about the five-day timeline and the possibility of being moved to hospital if she didn’t comply.
Amica regional director Hess points out that the wording of the letter doesn’t require that Sparrow move out in five days, only that there is a plan to do so in place. But this doesn’t change how Silva and Sparrow feel.
Our Comment
Marie Sparrow’s experience should give us all – both rich and poor – pause, in the matter of long-term care.
Anything private must be “cost-effective” and as profitable as possible. Business is business.
Given that Marie was able to afford to supplement what care Amica residence at Erin Mills is prepared to provide, one has to wonder why the residence was “not a suitable place for [her] to receive the care necessary for [her] to flourish.”
The reader is hard put not to agree with Mrs. Sparrow’s power of attorney that there was no reason why she should have to leave.
The case would seem to reflect a common characteristic of private health care – the “cherry-picking” syndrome. Private services tend to be selective about what they cover, and who qualifies.
One wonders if prospective residents are forewarned of limits beyond which they may be turfed in this manner.
The fumbling efforts to account for the ultimatum Mrs. Sparrow was given – “some poorly chosen words”…”some degree of misinterpretation”…the changing reason given… the need for a revised account of the meeting – raise questions that even those wealthy enough to favour private arrangements might want to ask.
Certainly public health care can and must operate on very different principles and it’s the only system able to guarantee all of us the level of security that should be one of the paramount advantages of life in society.
Élan
