The best news I can share with you today is the announcement from Tuesday, July 19, 2016 that the Ontario government has committed $100 million to assist caregivers. The full story is available here.
The monies are to be directed into the Community Care Access home care program. According to Health Minister Eric Hoskins $80 million will be allocated to provide an additional 350,000 hours of additional nursing care and 1.3 million additional hours of Personal Support Workers (PSW). I blogged last week on the importance of Personal Support Workers and so any increase is good news. Today on average, the CCAC will provide to eligible clients (based on an unofficial count of our current files) 14 hours per week of PSW service. This might be to provide bathing assistance to a frail senior, assist with meal preparation and assist with clothing, toileting, washing and morning and evening care preparations. For the 28% of Canadian family caregivers, this is a much needed reprieve. However with 168 hours in a week, there leaves a lot of unattended time.
Regardless, this is a step in the right direction. I wonder when we will see it implemented and available to our clients.
