Pilot program examines more than 200 cases of hoarding over past year

Early one morning in October 2011, Ian Chalmers died in a fire at his mother’s Vancouver home.

Firefighters called it the worst case of hoarding they’d ever seen.

Crews battled mountains of debris to try to reach the 50- year- old, who could be heard screaming for help from inside the burning building.

But boxes blocked the doors and windows. In the end, it took a team trained in high- angle rescue just to recover the body.

Eighteen months later, Chalmers’ tragic death continues to serve as an important reminder of the serious consequences of compulsive hoarding. “We’ve seen countless examples where ( hoarding) has been dangerous to a person’s safety and caused property damage to people not involved, most of the time neighbours,” said Carli Edwards, Vancouver’s assistant director of inspections and the person tasked with overseeing the newly formed hoarding action response team — known as HART.

The pilot program was launched in May 2012, partly in response to Chalmers’ death. It’s a partnership between the city and Vancouver Coastal Health that brings together four professionals — including a city inspector, fire inspector, and two mental- health workers — to jointly work with people identified as hoarders.

The team is also the subject of a University of B. C. study, with an expert in the field evaluating the team’s effectiveness and helping to find ways to better assist landlords, neighbours, friends and relatives to help hoarders stay safe and remain in their homes.

Edwards delivered the team’s first report card to city council Wednesday.

Among the highlights, the report notes the team has responded to more than 200 cases of hoarding since its launch. About 40 per cent of clients are over the age of 65 years and most, about 62 per cent, are men.

Edwards said the team has put much of its effort into developing and refining a consistent approach to hoarding. Team members work together to coordinate home visits and inspections to resolve the problems. To that end, clients are offered everything from help in organizing and de- cluttering to referrals to mental health services.

Cases are considered resolved when a client is safely living at home, access to windows and doors is clear, living spaces can be used for their intended purpose and the client is linked with appropriate health resources.

Sheila Woody, associate professor of psychology at UBC, said its too soon to accurately measure the success of the team.

But Woody said one of the big challenges is that there aren’t many resources for treatment in the community. Even if there were, a lot of people with hoarding find it difficult to recognize the problem as real and to commit to making changes, she noted.

Woody said people hoard for many different reasons. In some cases, a person may have a hoarding disorder. Others may suffer from depression or have a serious substance abuse problem.