“This program saved my life – if it’s shutdown, I’m going to go downhill fast.”
- Lawrence Bibby, Chimo Achievement Centre client
What do you do with a health-care program that helps people with serious disabilities like multiple sclerosis stay out of hospital or long-term care and instead lead independent lives – while saving taxpayers millions of dollars?
Any thoughtful analysis would conclude that this kind of innovative program should be a model for the province and be expanded.
But if you are the Fraser Health Authority, you simply shut down the program without even evaluating it, without talking to the administrator, staff or clients, all to save a whopping $165,000 a year.
That amount is less than half the $466,000 salary paid to Fraser Health’s CEO – Dr. Nigel Murray – and a pittance in the Authority’s $2.48 billion budget – but it actually pays for several staff to help keep 45 clients healthy and functioning.
But on Jan. 31, the Chimo Achievement Centre in Port Coquitlam will lock its doors after 26 years.
Clients will be told to stay home and watch television, with a bit more home care added to keep them there.
Or they can visit a seniors’ centre despite the fact most are too young to be seniors and those centres don’t have exercise programs for people in wheelchairs like Lawrence Bibby, who has MS.
I’ve known Lawrence for 35 years and when he told me what was going on, I couldn’t believe it.
But it is tragically true.
Elizabeth Oliveira is another Chimo client who knows it saves money.
“Before Chimo I used to be really sick in hospital three or four times a year – I haven’t been in hospital for two years,” said Oliveira, a 34-year-old who has muscular dystrophy, uses a trachea ventilator and gets help with breathing exercises.
Chimo’s Administrator Arlene Hartley-Lewchuk is overwhelmingly worried about her clients.
“We’re not seeing any suitable placements for our clients – there is nowhere for them to go but home,” she says. “Physically their muscle tone is going to deteriorate.
“But the big thing is they will lose their ability to live at home,” Hartley-Lewchuk said. “There will be increased falls, which means hospital stays.”
Amazingly, Hartley-Lewchuk says Fraser Health never visited the Chimo program to evaluate it before cutting all funding.
Fraser Health Authority’s spokesperson Roy Thorpe didn’t have an answer about its lack of evaluation before killing Chimo as part of cutting $160 million.
He did have a response when asked if Fraser Health would reconsider its decision to close Chimo: “No.”
But Chimo clients are not giving up. Bibby created an online petition and a Facebook page to urge Fraser Health and B.C. to save Chimo.
You can find the petition at: www.ipetitions.com and the Facebook page at: www.facebook.com by searching for “Chimo”.
Read more from Bill Tieleman at thetyee.ca
Email: weststar@telus.net Website: billtieleman.blogspot.com
