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GOLDSTREAM
NEWS GAZETTE
SERVING THE BEST SUSHI ON THE WESTSHORE 250.590.8686
WEST SHORE THEATRE
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New captain named
737 Goldstream Ave
Politics create new drama for community theatre concerns on the West Shore. Page A3
West Shore based BCHL club announced former Penticton Vee will captain Grizzlies this season. Page A18
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Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Beside Station House Pub
MON - SUN 11:00 am - 9:30 pm DINE IN • TAKE OUT • DELIVERY
Breaking news at GOLDSTREAMGAZETTE.COM
End of a vision Dementia care model too far ahead of its time Jim Zeeben News staff
The house is silent and empty now but Nichole Donaldson’s dream is still vividly alive. Donaldson made headlines for her vision of a new way to care for the elderly as they make the difficult transition from independence to the need for constant care. Open Hearts Adult Daycare welcomed its first clients to a refurbished home at 647 Kelly Rd. in April 2011. On June 15, the service closed its doors for the last time and the house was put up for sale. Unless she can find an unexpected source of funding, Donaldson says her vision of a private service to complement crowded public care is just not financially feasible. Not yet anyway. “I’m still very passionate about the model of care,” she said, listing off demographic stats to support her case. Aging Baby Boomers are beginning to suffer from dementia and the population bulge their generation represents has caused concern that public health care can’t keep up. A primary nurse with 30 years of experience, Donaldson believes groups of people with dementia can get along fine.
Jim Zeeben/News staff
Nicole Donaldson sits in the empty living room of the home she formerly used for her Colwood business Open Hearts Adult Daycare. After two years, Donaldson says red tape and a lack of government funding made it financially impossible for her to continue offering the service. “It only takes two people to look after 10 instead of 10 people looking after 10,” she said, explaining why she thinks her model will have to one day replace the labour-intensive model that remains in place. “We won’t be able to sustain that.” Donaldson, who has worked for two decades at Mount St. Mary in Fairfield, says it’s usually when people are taken out of social situations and isolated that negative behaviours begin to manifest.
People need to express themselves and will act out if no one is paying attention to them. What’s more, Donaldson said, problems arise when people who have been isolated are then reintroduced into a group. Her idea appears to have worked, judging from the testimony of those who used the service before it shut down. It just couldn’t compete on costs against public services that are heavily subsidized
by the health authority. “You keep hearing about this growing tide of dementia but I, for the life of me, cannot understand why VIHA would not support her efforts,” said Barb Denney, who used Open Hearts about once per week for respite from caring for her husband. PLEASE SEE: Vision of dementia care model too costly, Page A22
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Sale ends August 26th, 2012 or while quantitites last.