Friday, 10 January 2025

Healthcare

Op-ed: Nova Scotia needs to fund more dementia training in long term care facilities

Karis Mitchell: Nova Scotia needs a provincial long term care strategy that revisits training and staffing hours so that the care facilities can provide the optimal care that is required by its residents. To be placed in a care facility at such a vulnerable stage in our lives can be traumatizing, so it is our responsibility to ensure that we speak openly about these concerns. We must speak up for those that do not have a voice, and those that voices that may not be perceived as valuable in our society. 

Judy Haiven: Not even a hug for Truro rape victim

Judy Haiven: Not a kind word, not a cup of vending machine coffee, not even a hug. And don’t get us started on why the young woman was not privileged enough to see a doctor or a nurse.  This is what happened to a rape victim who walked into the Colchester East Hants Health Centre hospital in Truro last week.

It is really about basic dignity and respect – Louise Bradley on mental health care and living in institutions

For me, the testimony by Louise Bradley, CEO of the Mental Health Commission of Canada, was one of the highlights of this week’s proceedings at the human rights inquiry. That’s why I was pleased when she was willing to be interviewed. We talk about mental health, the harm of living in an institution, stigma, and the benefits of community living. Louise was at one time heavily involved in the East Coast Forensic Hospital in Dartmouth, and we also talk about the folks there who have been conditionally discharged but can’t get the supportive housing they need. So they just stick around, sometimes for many years.

‘This isn’t solved by giving somebody a bag of food.’ An interview with food insecurity expert Valerie Tarasuk

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We interview food security expert Dr. Valerie Tarasuk, who will be visiting Nova Scotia later this week. She talks about hunger counts that don’t count hunger, food banks that don’t solve food insecurity, and income thresholds that don’t reflect it. Also, why people who are food insecure get sick so much, even if the illness has nothing to do with diet. And finally, what we should do to fix the problem.