Herb Gray waited 48 hours for a bed: widow
Former deputy prime minister Herb Gray, who was a member of Parliament when medicare was adopted in 1966, was forced to wait in the emergency room at The Ottawa Hospital on a stretcher for 48 hours before being moved to a bed, his widow Sharon Sholzberg-Gray says.
Mr. Gray, one of the longest-serving MPs in Canadian history, died at the Civic campus of The Ottawa Hospital in April. He was 82.
Mr. Gray suffered from Parkinson’s disease, which meant he had frequent falls. That and other chronic conditions sent him to hospital by ambulance four or five times, said Ms. Sholzberg-Gray, where he had to wait in the emergency department on a stretcher until a bed became available.
Ms. Sholzberg-Gray, a lawyer who was president of the Canadian Healthcare Association in the late 1990s, said even a career as an advocate for changes that were needed in the health-care system didn’t prepare her for the stress and anxiety of having a frail loved one on a stretcher in emergency for so long.
Such a long wait without a real hospital bed worsens a patient’s condition, she said. “You can’t even get off the bed yourself.”
Spending days in the emergency room, she said, “does not create the best conditions for your future health status.”
Ms. Sholzberg-Gray said the issues she had argued about as an advocate “became much more real when I faced them day to day.”
“I spent the last 25 years of my career as president and CEO of different health associations. I was the spokesperson for the publicly funded health system in this country, advocating for appropriate funding so Canadians could have equitable access to programs that met their needs,” she said.
“Still, I don’t think I was prepared for the personal challenge of being the family caregiver and manager and the difficulties that one has to have a continuum of care that was seamless.” Ms. Sholzberg-Gray said she doesn’t blame the hospital, which provided good care, but she said the health system needs to better meet the needs of the elderly.
“The real question is: Should frail elderly people lie behind a curtain for 48 hours? No.”
The plight of those frail elderly in emergency rooms was highlighted earlier this month when Quebec released a report that found nonambulatory patients — the majority of them seniors — wait an average of 18.4 hours in the emergency room. The Canadian Medical Association is calling for the federal government to take leadership in developing a national seniors strategy. Seniors, notes association president Dr. Chris Simpson, account for 45%50% of health-care spending, and that will grow.