Apple Magazine - Fall 2018

to get the care they need for complex health conditions and terminal illnesses.

Alberta’s health system has two distinct parts: one cares for people with severe injury or illness in hospitals, and the other cares for people’s day-to-day health needs in the community.

Our hospitals tend to have many patients who could be better cared for at home.

The enhancing care in the community approach connects you, your home and your wellness. It includes both physical and mental well-being. It emphasizes prevention and community care. It delivers treatment close to home or even at home, whenever possible. Ultimately, it means healthier Albertans.

At age 96, Yvonne Routledge was
spending more time in hospital. Her care
Edson, for example, licensed practical
nurses assess, plan, deliver and evaluate
patients for a wide range of care. In turn,
this gives home care case managers the
time they need to support every aspect of
patient care.

In Westlock, added support enables patients to receive care at home rather than in a facility.

Another example is the Hospital at Home program, which gives children chemotherapy and other oncology care in their home. It’s the first program of its kind in Canada.

Elsewhere in Alberta, continuing care
centres such as designated supportive
living and long-term care are getting
more support for their residents. This
means fewer residents are going to a
hospital or an emergency department for
conditions such as a bladder infection or
a fall. And more palliative care and end-
of-life care is making it easier for people
team at the continuing care facility where
she lived didn’t always have the health
expertise she needed. She often had to be
taken to hospital by ambulance and wait
for a bed.
Two years ago, however, she was
connected to the Community Paramedic
program, and the stressful visits to
the hospital disappeared. It changed
Routledge’s outlook on life.
“The paramedics are excellent,” she
says. “I’m happier because I don’t always
have to be taken to hospital for treatment
that can easily be done in the comfort of
my home.”
The Community Paramedic program
started in 2012 in Calgary and expanded
to Edmonton in 2014. Additional
investments, beginning in 2017, allowed
the program to expand across the
province.
For Routledge, getting the care she
needs at home from paramedics has been
a positive.