Need for culturally sensitive seniors care on the rise in B.C.

Asian-Canadian seniors often have poor health outcomes after being placed in longterm-care homes that aren’t culturally sensitive to their needs, says a newly formed Asian Canadian Seniors Health Network.

For many seniors in a culturally insensitive nursing home, where no one speaks their language or understands their ways, their last years become their most socially isolated and miserable. And they often die earlier than expected living in facilities they don’t feel comfortable.

That was the case for Henry Yu’s 85-yearold grandmother who suffered a stroke and, like all seniors going into long-term residential care, had to take the first available bed in the health authority region where she lived.

“Her last three years, she was unhappy living in a facility where no one spoke Chinese and she had chronic indigestion because her diet had changed. She would say I don’t want to live anymore and she never came off the wait list,” said Yu, a University of B.C. history professor, referring to the long wait to get into the linguistically and culturally appropriate care home run by SUCCESS, one of the largest social-service agencies in B.C.

“She might have lived a lot longer if she was in a culturally sensitive facility. There are many stories like this, but these are challenges that we can meet.”

Yu is one of a number of people who helped create Asian Canadian Seniors Health Network, which includes organizations such as SUCCESS and the Progressive Intercultural Community Services Society — both of which are delivering culturally sensitive residential care services for Asian-Canadian seniors.

Some of the key recommendations from a recent roundtable discussion include:

Given changing demographics and a growing senior population, the government needs to give a high priority to new proposals for residential-care beds that are culturally sensitive for Asian seniors.

Allocate additional resources to enhance assisted-living units to meet the health and well-being needs of Asian-Canadian seniors.

Create new beds to meet the increasing demands for culturally sensitive long-term care facilities.

Network co-chair and SUCCESS CEO Queenie Choo said 60 per cent of the population in Richmond is Asian and the demand for culturally sensitive care will only continue to grow.

She said the waiting list is four years for Asian seniors to get into the long-term residential care home run by SUCCESS.