THUNDER BAY – An order from the Ministry of Health for staff at Hogarth Riverview Manor to stop admitting patients has been lifted.
More than two months ago the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care issued a temporary cease-admissions order on Hogarth Riverview Manor as there were nine outstanding compliance orders causing some concerns.
St. Joseph's Care Group CEO Tracy Buckler said these concerns were in respect to resident care and safety.
“We developed a plan that we had to submit to the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care to be able to resolve the outstanding issues,” Buckler said.
“There’s been a whole lot of hard work done by (more than 400 staff) over the course of the last two months.”
Buckler said the compliance orders were clear as far as the outstanding areas and a lot of training needed to be done.
“It’s not that the staff aren’t trained and it’s not that are staff weren’t doing their job, but very specific training that’s required for the Long-term Care Homes Act.”
The management team had a lot of work to put forward to be able to get the appropriate training, to ensure staff were doing the rights things and making sure the residents were cared for in a safe and quality manner.
The staff worked hard to make those changes and improve the way care and services are being delivered.
“What we did differently this time was we made sure the training had a number of components, so not only speaking to staff, not only teaching in the sense of sharing information but also repeating hands-on,” Buckler said.
“Lots of people learn better in a hands-on environment. To be able to go to the resident home areas, repeat the training and do some different things that make it real for people, so our management team put a whole lot of effort forward to make sure staff were comfortable in what was going on.”
Buckler said the Ministry of Health brings in compliance and inspectors on a regular basis.
A team of four inspectors visited the building last week and based on the inspection and results they are lifting the cease admissions order and officials are able to proceed with admitting new residents starting Jan. 23.
Out of the nine outstanding compliance orders HRM achieved compliance in six of them, so there are still three needing a bit more work.
“The six we complied with are the ones that are the most critical from the Ministry of Health’s prospective,” Buckler said.
“That’s why they lifted the cease admissions order, but by no way is the work over…the work will continue forever as far as what needs to be done to ensure we are meeting compliance and legislation.”
Buckler added most importantly staff need to ensure they are providing the quality of resident care St. Joseph’s Care Group is known for.
