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The following letter was submitted in response an article entitled: One year later: admissions still halted at Sunset Manor. The following letter writer lives in Norway, but her parents live in Collingwood and her father is on a waiting list for a bed at Sunset Manor.
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Editor,
Every single day still counts in our fight for long-term care
One day at a time. Here are some other numbers that illustrate our family`s current struggle:
- 804: number of days my dad, with advanced dementia, has been on the waiting list for a place at Sunset Manor long-term care centre.
- 384: number of days Sunset Manor has been closed to new admissions.
- 59: number of days since Dad was put on the crisis list for three long-term care homes in Collingwood.
- 37: number of empty beds at Sunset Manor.
Dad's still at home despite his acute need for professional residential care. Yet despite the new notoriety we have gained by complaining to the paper, Sunset Manor's predicament is still shrouded in silence. This also despite several courageous and heartfelt letters to the editor of this paper. I count, and am eternally grateful for, five such letters.
Sunset Manor is the only long-term care home in Ontario currently under admission stop orders from the Ministry of Long-Term Care.
One number I don't pretend to know is how many employees are working hard daily to provide good care to the current residents at Sunset Manor. I know there are lots of you. Thank you for sticking with us in this difficult time. We are very grateful to you and hope you read this letter as a vote of support
Another number I don`t know, and couldn't even hope to guess, is the number of nights since my mum last had a decent sleep.
Two: fingers crossed. That's what we are told one needs to do in order to get this situation resolved. Despite all our efforts in contacting public officials over the last eight months, it all boils down apparently to luck. Every interaction we have with healthcare staff these days closes with cheerful instruction to cross our fingers. Our best bet for relieving the intense pressure on my mum (as dad's carer) is that we keep our fingers crossed and hope that Sunset Manor will be reopened "soon."
If you are like most people in Collingwood you have 10 fingers and 10 toes. I'd like to ask you to stand with us and each of the other families waiting for a place at Sunset Manor. Please cross all you have for us. And please cross them for the current residents and staff who urgently need the management issues resolved there. Our lives, and those of some of your friends and neighbours, depend on it.
If you're not into crossing fingers, then you can help by contacting the warden of Simcoe County, George Cornell, or Collingwood's (Simcoe-Grey) new MPP, Brian Saunderson. You can stand up and be counted too.
Heather Mason
Levanger, Norway
