(Toronto) Patients hospitalized in Ontario waiting for long-term care spaces will be able to be transferred to a home that was not their preferred one up to 150 kilometers away, and will have to pay a $400 fee per day if they refuse, the provincial government announced Wednesday.
Posted at 4:24 p.m.
Starting next week, patients in southern Ontario can be moved up to 70 kilometers from where he is, while those in northern Ontario can be moved up to 150 miles, Health Minister Sylvia Jones and Long-Term Care Minister Paul Calandra said Wednesday.
“Regulations and guidance will be given to our healthcare partners that will keep them close to home and respect religious, ethnic and language preferences. The couples will stay together,” Ms.me Jones and Mr. Calandra.
The regulations announced Wednesday are part of an effort to free up hospital beds as the health care system grapples with temporary emergency room closures and a backlog of surgeries.
“We want to be clear about what this policy does: it frees up hospital beds so people waiting for surgery can get them sooner; it eases the strain on crowded emergency departments by admitting patients earlier,” they argued.
Ministers said the policy will only affect patients who are awaiting discharge from hospital and whose preferred long-term care homes have no places available.
The changes will come into effect from Wednesday of next week.
Beginning Nov. 20, hospitals will be required to charge patients who have been discharged by their doctor and refuse to be transferred to a home that is not of their choice a daily fee of $400.
The province introduced legislation last month that would allow hospitals to temporarily send so-called alternate level of care patients to a long-term care home they did not choose.
The province said about 1,800 of those patients are currently in hospital waiting for a place in one of their five preferred choices in a long-term care home.
The bill, which passed the legislature without public hearings, sparked outrage from seniors and seniors’ advocates.
Mme Jones and Mr Calandra said the distances are “based on feedback we have received from the industry and provide hospitals with the options needed for this policy to be effective”.
Hospital emergency departments across the province have been closed for hours or days at a time in recent months, largely due to a shortage of nurses.