Grab a beverage.
National Post- The Fall: My once-vibrant dad emerged broken from the hospital. Then he was gone
Falls are all-too common among the elderly and often foretell a deterioration in health.
It is the cause of 85 per cent of all injury-related hospitalizations among seniors in Canada, according to Health Canada. And rates have been increasing. Twenty to 30 per cent of seniors experience at least one fall a year and many, like my father, land in hospital as a result.
Spend a bit of time in an emergency department and it won’t take long to realize that many of those ambulances making their way to hospitals, lights flashing, are carrying an older person who has fallen.
Hurry up and wait…
I would only fully understand later how dangerous that time in a bed or a stretcher can be for the elderly. Every day, every hour, starts a downward slide of mobility and overall physical and mental health, which often prolongs their hospital stay in a dangerous feedback loop. That is especially true for the elderly.
For every day an older person spends lying in bed, it takes two days to recover the strength and function that has been lost. It also takes just eight hours lying on a stretcher for a frail elderly patient’s skin to begin to break down, which could lead to debilitating pressure ulcers, or bed sores. Typical waits in many Ontario emergency departments are nearing the 20-hour mark, but can sometimes be higher.
That means it’s working
I agree! I am 72 and in reasonably good health. I have long known/suspected that the government of Canada wants all people over the age of 65 to be “gone”. Even though we contributed to CPP (I started with my summer job at the age of 16 and continued through university and the 30 years of self-employment and then working for others), we are considered to be a “drain” on the system.
Take care of yourself, no one else will.
Canada is ranked #19 in life expectancy. You can do worse.
The United States is #47, behind Thailand and the Czech Republic.
https://www.worldometers.info/demographics/life-expectancy/
For how bad the American diet is versus the rest of the world it’s pretty impressive.
“For how bad the American diet is versus the rest of the world it’s pretty impressive.”
It is. Their people are overall much less healthy than ours, yet their medical system is head and shoulders above our own. If you enter an American hospital with an unknown malady, they will do test after test until they find out what is wrong with you. They do not shrug their shoulders, take their best guess and put you on a 6-month waiting list for additional tests, or give you a prescription for antibiotics and send you home.
(yes, yes…you need to have insurance, I know. But still…)
First, the vast majority of people in the US do have insurance through their employer or Medicaid/Medicare. Most of the people who don’t have made a conscious decision it is worth it because Obamacare kept its promise to lower premiums by raising deductibles so high it makes financial sense for many people to roll the dice by not paying premiums (because unless you end up in the hospital the insurance/deductible will cost you more than just paying out of pocket).
As far as tests go, in the US the battle is more to keep them from doing unnecessary tests they can bill for than it is fighting or waiting to get a test done.
That has to do with lifestyle, not the healthcare system. I’ve been in both systems, there is no comparison, ours is a joke compared to theirs.
It is a complete total clown show in the US at this point.You know that they passed a bill that finacially rewards hospitals with A LOT of money if they use certain treatments such as Remdesivir and ventilators and if there is a positive Covid diagnosis -even if you are there with something like a broken leg-complete immunity for all care given!!!! Really there are no words for the monsters who did this.
I did not believe it at first,but I now know several people who survived or lost a loved one.
Here are some links if you want to read about what can happen in the US.The first is about a doctor who was killed at the hospital he used to work at. It is a bit raw.
https://deathatbaylor.com/
The second are verified stories of “protocol” victims.
https://formerfedsgroup.org/cases/
Whatabouters never have answers.
Lazy fcks just point and say its worse over there.
That’s why, when they’re wallowing in shit, they rationalize, “Hey, at least I’m not drowning in it.”
Exactly.
The calculation of “Life Expectancy” is based on many statistics. I suspect the number would be different if they did not count drug overdoses…
The Canadian “Free” Healthcare system is broken as long as most people don’t experience the high cost and extreme shortages that this “free” system provides.
Here in Montreal, you can get excellent care if you are REALLY sick. Anything else, forget about it…
Life expectancy comparisons between countries are completely invalid because there are no set standards for the data, and you should trust any organization using such comparisons less.
One example I have seen is that in the US and many other western countries they will make a big effort to deliver and save even very premature babies, and those unsuccessful cases obviously damage the life expectancy/infant mortality numbers. In other countries they don’t make that effort so those deaths don’t count as a “life” or “infant”.
There are even countries where if a baby is delivered even full term and dies within 24 hours that country records it as a stillbirth, again helping their life expectancy/infant mortality numbers.
I wonder if stats canada has an Actuarial Life Table like the SSA has:
( https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html )
the closest I can find is https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1310013401 but it’s outdated information, and doesn’t cover every age.
And as usual, statistical analysis might tell you something useful about groups of population, but on the whole is useless for information about individuals, despite the government claiming things like BMI are important for individuals
Don B – just a thought, but how many young men do we send off to save the world? Plenty come back and in a box, disable or mentally broken. Is that considered inthe statistics?
Yes, but the distribution in US varies tremendously. Life expectancy among ghetoers and illegals is very different than among the civilized.
Ya I seen that in Idaho.. healthcare premiums for a HMO in Idaho were not even a quarter of what they would have been in Flint, Michigan.
i think adjusted for diverse violence ie blacks they are similar to canada. the natives in canada would even the stats up a bit if there were more of them .
Gee, you mean it’s so bad, it is almost like they’re doing it on purpose?
Well if you get rid of all the people that can convey harder, trying , yet more fulfilling times no one but the vegetables tended by the progs are left.
The Dear Leader wants old stock Canadians to be eliminated. This is one way. MAID is another.
Immigrants from the third world will replace them and always vote for the Liberals who brought them to the land of free.
Anyone defending a system with 20 hour wait times is crazy.
That was a painful read. She kept blaming “covid -19” and “the pandemic”, while seemingly oblivious that it was mismanagement and not a respiratory virus that caused all the healthcare problems.
The author is a long-time writer and editor at the Ottawa Citizen. Her faith in socialism has been unwavering.
Best Healthcare System in The World – and it’s FREE!
Third party single payer, not “free”
Have a sense of humour. We’re all in this cage together. The only thing that’s free is advice off the Internet. And if you ask me …
I have a lovely frail elderly man who is a neighbor, his morbidly obese wife falls almost daily-he can’t lift her because she’s three times his size-an ambulance shows up hauls her up and off they go. Another elderly neighbor had a massive stroke the first week of covid, she can’t get out of her house, has had no follow up care, and no at home mobility treatment via physio. It’s bad out there for all patients, but the elderly seem disposable?
The aging boomer glut is starting to show its fate. Will the healthcare(?) system be more supported/balanced in 15 to 20 years?
Healthcare will all be private-pay in 15 years. There is an excellent possibility it will be private in 5 years.
All you need is a crisis and a federal election. Poof, no more socialized medicine.
the gut of the brontosaurus shaped population of boomers is just hitting the critical years. the system wont make 15 or more years .
ps , Im one of them @68, I already go private as often as possible
Soon there will be a sign at the entrance to hospital emergency depts: “Current wait time is 20 hours, the MAID wait time is 2 minutes. Which do you prefer?”
A friend has cancer, his wait time to see the oncologist, after which his treatment start time will be determined, is one month. Based on his condition, he may be dead before the first treatment. Worked and paid taxes all his life, never unemployed etc. What the heck is the use of the government-run health system?
I do not read this piece as sympathetically as most. I am not sentimental toward the aged. Perhaps that’s because I’m in my 85th year.
Everyone wants a health care system that has no wait times and spares no expense when it comes to state-of-the-art treatment. If that’s what you want then realise we will have to pay for it. But nobody wants to do that. I sure don’t.
The author’s father’s particular predicament was inevitable given that he a frail 90 year old and was allowed to drive and go out in public. What should have happened is that he should have been at home and cared for by family members.
What the author should have first done is realise that her father’s time had come. Then she should have taken her father home and cared for him there. Her father should have been allowed to die in his own bed as comfortably as circumstances would allow. He was ninety and frail!! Did she think he was going to last forever? She and her other family members did not want to face the fact that he was going to die. By avoiding the truth they ended up making his death more miserable than it should have been.
As for myself, if I live to be ninety I am to be given no medical intervention unless I specifically request it. I have filled out a No Resuscitation Form to give medical professionals legal protection. I have prepared my family for the fact that I am going to die soon and to let me die without undue fuss. Let nature take its course.
There are more than you think who resent working hard, making money and live in a place where it is illegal to buy healthcare services. I can and have gotten better care for my dog.
Totally agreed. At his age that cascade of events is usually only going in one direction and all the interventions just hasten it. Most people don’t want to accept their loved ones’ deaths (or their own).
If it were so easy for the elder’s kids to decide those things or have the ability to enforce them… life expectancy would probable go up by ten years but at what costs? Elderly people have rights too, like yourself. When my mom says no then it’s no. What if your kids arrived on your doorstep and said you have to move from your independence? If older people want to live alone then one of their kids shouldn’t force them not to regardless of health. I have offered and begged, but my 78 year old mother refuses to live with someone, whether me, my sister, or assisted living. Not all old people dying alone is because of negligent kids.
She’ll probably one day fall and die. But that’s how she wants to go out. Better that than cancer she says. I visit her often and try to make sure falling isn’t the cause.
agree and disagree.
yes it was almost certainly brought on by being out driving at 90.
But a lot of old people seem fine as long as they are active, it’s when they no longer feel able to help and just stay home that the decline starts.
In my family, my mother’s partner was walking across the road on a pedestrian crossing to go shop, when he fell and broke his hip at 91, he gradually declined from that point till his death at 93. But even into his late 80’s he was fine going on walks for a few k. He stopped driving at 88 i believe.
“Health care journalist” gets a little bit of education could be another way of looking at this article.
She will forget her lessons learned soon enough and go back to telling the public we need to pay much more tax for our free health care…
It is always some body’s elses fault and responsibility. It’s a Canadian thing.
There is good and bad in the system. Sadly luck is part of the equation. My wife was lucky three times. Some people I knew were not so lucky.
When asked what defines our country, many in the chattering class will respond “It is our Health Care system that binds us as Canadians.”
Sad.
A failed Welfare experiment is the best we can come up with for a National Identity?
That is what we are all about – Gov’t dependency?
Time to leave, Alberta and Sask.
“When asked what defines our country, many in the chattering class will respond “It is our Health Care system that binds us as Canadians.”
Sad.”
It is. Especially when they keep telling us that our system is “free”…
(yeah, no it’s not…not even close…)
A fall at 90 is indicative of other health problems, in this case a slow and weakened heart. This family seemed yo be okay letting their elderly parent live on their own with little help or intervention but when the time came to face the music of the fact his time was up they felt someone should do something. The end was inevitable and the hospital and medical staff knew this but just would not share it with the family. If life expectancy is less than two years they generally won’t treat. It saves money. A friend in his early 70s was told that since he had cancer they would not treat his heart problem as his life expectancy was less than two years. He went south, paid for heart treatment, and continues on.
Everyone dies of something, eventually. A perfectly pristine lifestyle does not guarantee anything whatsoever. I have 4 buried close girl friends who died before age 70 (whose lifestyles were better than mine) to prove that.
It is great that the 90-year old was enjoying his independent life to the end.
I am on the cutting edge of the now retired/retiring boomers. We are in for a VERY bad time. I had a senior fall, so was admitted to hospital as I could not sit nor stand. All they did was endless tests (I think medicare pays $$$ by test) and farm out pills for $, plus take very careful care of the PAYING out-of-country visiting, whiny roommates who seemed to need care EVERY evening from 2-4:30 AM, once they took a sleeping pill at 5 PM. No physio until day 12, or even a walk down the hall.
I HATE FORCED communal living with sick weirdos! And I do not take sleeping pills, as I do not need them. I did read 4 good books in the middle of the night.
Finally, I drafted a note to the dr. and said that I was checking out the next day at noon, asked him to please prepare a discharge document, having called my offspring to pick me up. This is my local hospital, so I could not do a “hissy fit walk-out”, much as I wanted to do so reading my books at night.
Fortunately, at home, I have slept well in my very comfy bed, and am more-or-less better doing normal things, taking care of my dog, eating whatever and gaining some strength two weeks on.
Perhaps group retirement homes are mostly for the living dead.
I lost a whopping 18 lbs.in hospital, likely mostly muscle, during those 15 days, mostly lying prone, even though I ate most of the food on meal trays. Most of the food was ok, but tiny (1-2 oz.) portions of protein.
Sounds like the experience a relative of mine had. His wife experienced much the same care as the poor man in the National Post article.
But this relative was an American, and living in the US.
If the total $$$ that go into our bloated universal health care system went instead into dedicated health accounts owned and managed by every citizen, birth to death, and all healthcare providers were private or non-profit, Canada WOULD have the best healthcare in the world – by a wide margin.
“If the total $$$ that go into our bloated universal health care system went instead into dedicated health accounts owned and managed by every citizen, birth to death, and all healthcare providers were private or non-profit, Canada WOULD have the best healthcare in the world – by a wide margin.”
That would also eliminate the problem of far too many administrators per doctor/nurse.
(and what does a ‘hospital board’ even do, anyway?)
totally agree, but it is the whiny self serving libtards who would raise such a fuss, just as they did about tax-free savings accounts. there is something repulsive about a person sporting a 10k$ full sleeve tattoo crying that they can’t afford to pay a user fee for healthcare.
^^^that is certainly a step in the right direction. Single payor is less a problem than government providers. Government does nothing cheaply or well, let private providers provide and compete for customers.
The left’s political ideology is more important to them then actual patient welfare and results.
Talk to one sometime.
Mention that every healthcare system better than ours uses both public and private
You’ll soon see that Marxist political ideology is their number one priority.
Just about every family I know has their own horror stories about Ontario’s health care system. Yet it continues to spiral ever-downward at increasing speed. In the last thirty years or so, every political Party has been in power – so they have all had their chances to fix things, but instead, contributed to the decline.
But, hey, it’s Canada. So let granny rot in her crap while we focus on the important stuff: superbowl ads, tucker in dreamland, and soapy’s new squeeze.
falls.
l fell off my 10 spd 2008? 9? broke my collar bone 2 pcs.
that was good since those breaks are not condusive to a cast, so when it healed the pcs lined up normally.
until 2023 down l went again and now ehen l configure my rt shoulder a certain way the end connected to the shoulder kinda ‘sticks up’.
but l survived because 3 weeks later l was smashing concrete into gravel for a small job.
l dont think in my case even if l take a header l will break any of the large bones.
in 2019 my legs shared the task of pushing 1685 pounds on ye olde leg press.
l call it bone memory.
good fortune follows me. there was a 15 year gap between the 2 occasions l had my helmet on when l wasnt riding, 1st time l had left the bike at the shop, 2nd time such a big rush from the chiro for my puppy’s vet appt l left it on.
good thing.
lm holding Samson in a sort of ‘bear hug’, kinda leaning over him.
well he aint having none of this, heaves me up and l do a somersault into the corner of the wall.
with the helmet on for no particular reason.
or maybe ‘Somebody’ arranged for that.
15 years and 20 minutes after the 1st inconsequential and explainable instance the 2nd time l escape a concussion and severe laceration on the scalp.
his name is Samson he’s part mastiff and part bull terrier. the size of his dad and the muscle density of his mom. lve never seen muscle that sinuous anywhere in a living animal but his mom had it ins spades gawd was she fast.
belonged to a tenant, she cd be at the back of the yard in a tiny fraction over a second onto the poor groundhog still buried there.
l adore canines. my present will specifies $5000 follows any pet plus another $1000 for each year after the signing of the will which was 2020
wjhen l sell lm going to revise that figure up and have already told the vet clinic they will be getting some multiple of $10,000 the vet suggested a pet oscilloscope device. she doesnt know it yet but the figure now sits at $35,000.
the *only* individual hooman mentioned is a writer l met who’s in line for a cpl grand. all the rest going to my puppies, their clinic and the local wildlife rehab organization whom EXUDE professionalism.
l have official begun the process of disengaging from society and walking away, turning my back on the corruption chaos and especially indifference that has dogged (pun intended) me since early grade school.
(psst, hint: that’s what happens with autism ya cant ‘connect’; with me ‘strike 2’ is l got a face like a mule. l read the research, homely ones are regularly discriminated against. its the only category so common, so prevalent, it NEVER gets mention with religion, race, gender, age, body type bla bla bla)
and the good news after today fambly daye in ontariowe, l got everything on my xmas break done except tidy the workshop!!! aint life grand !!!!
praise the lord and pass the bug repellant !!! ah, you think the end is a shooting war? l got news for ya. its all going bonkers including nature. we will be plagued with pestilence and the known artificial remedies are all BANNED.
skill testing Q: ya got a fully loaded semi in yer hand and 5 full clips.
how may out of the 3 billion locusts in that cloud on the horizon you gonna pop?
then what?
there
will
be
nowhere
to
hide
when the end comes. l got a deal with my lord and maker, pulEEEZE let me live long enough to exact a personal vengeance on the parties and structures responsible for 6 decades of abuse. let me live long enough to prop myself up on my unbroken arm and survey the devastation and the next thing l hear are thundering shouts of joy lm in paradise!!