INTERESTING NEWS Canada’s Oldest First Nations Newspaper - Serving Nuu-chah-nulth-aht since 1974 Canadian Publications Mail Product Vol. 48 - No. 22—November 18, 2021 haas^i>sa Sales Agreement No. 40047776
Elder’s plight points to need for health advocacy Chery Amos relied on the hospital to treat her chronic condition, resulting in 25 emergency visits in one year By Eric Plummer Ha-Shilth-Sa Editor Port Alberni, BC - Just over a year ago, the ache in Cheryl Amos’s lower abdomen had become unbearable, leading her to seek emergency treatment at the West Coast General Hospital. “I was in deep pain, intense pain, and I was throwing up for three days non-stop, so I went to the hospital,” recalled the Tseshaht member. She was hooked up to a machine intravenously for her dehydration, and given Gravol for nausea, but after she was released her situation had not improved the following day, when she recalls returning with a bladder infection. “I kept throwing up,” said the 71-yearold. “I went there three consecutive days.” By the third time she was in the West Coast General’s emergency department, a doctor seemed unconvinced that Amos had a problem requiring medical treatment. “She says to me, ‘Cheryl, have you been drinking?’,” recounted Amos. “‘No not at all. Not in the least. Besides, you’ve got my blood tests,’ I said to her.” “She said to me, ‘There’s absolutely nothing wring with you’,” continued Amos. “I just got up and left because she insulted me.” The elder went home, treating the pain in the bottom left side of her stomach and lower back with hot water bottles. But the agony didn’t subside, and five days later she was back in the hospital, desperately seeking treatment on Oct. 13, 2020. This time painkillers and more Gravol were prescribed, plus liquid potassium to help recover her body from the effects of constant vomiting. But Amos kept throwing up, and continued to seek help in Port Alberni’s hospital, a drawn-out ordeal that has totaled 25 visits to the emergency department over the last year. Day surgery was finally arranged for Feb. 5 of this year, but the scope failed to locate the source of Amos’s pain. Meanwhile her body had become severely bloated, and 85 pounds had been put onto her frame that normally weighs 135, said Amos. “I gave a urine specimen and it was the colour of iced tea,” she recalled, noting that the pain was taking its toll on her physically. “My lower back was giving out because of it.” She long suspected her kidneys were the location of the problem, but as the emergency hospital visits continued, the series of doctors she saw were unable to pinpoint the source of the pain, said
Photo by Eric Plummer
Cheryl Amos holds a box full of hospital admission bracelets, prescriptions and medical documents she has collected over the past year of seeking help for a chronic condition. She currently awaits a meeting with a kidney specialist. Amos. and Surgeons of B.C. and the last Canada “It was constant, I couldn’t touch it, I census. couldn’t wear my waistbands at all. I kept According to a provincially commistelling them at the hospital it’s right here. sioned report released by Mary Ellen I told every single doctor I’ve seen,” she Turpel-Lafond in February, Amos’s said. “But what is so frustrating is that I reliance on the emergency department is couldn’t get them to look into what was not unusual among First Nations people really wrong.” in B.C. A CT scan on Oct. 6, 2021 also failed “First Nations, on average, are 75 per to pinpoint the problem, but the agony cent more likely to visit the emergency finally began to ease when Amos left the than anyone else - and the reason for that hospital with a prescription for painkillis that they are not attached to primary ers and antibiotics for a badly infected care,” said the former judge and provinkidney. cial child advocate during a Feb. 4 press “By the ninth it eased off,” she said, conference. “Their needs get more acute recalling the first time her condition has because they don’t get primary care. And been pain-free in 18 months. when they go into emergency, it may not Amos has a family doctor, but she be the place to do the referral, to do the hasn’t seen him in over a decade due to communication, to provide the culturallydiscomfort and “very bad incidents,” she safe care, because at times emergency said. The COVID-19 pandemic has also departments themselves are in a state of limited availability to family doctors, crisis.” making an immediate appointment to This dynamic has been taxing the seek answers about her pain an imposprovincial system, said Health Minister sibility. Amos has been unsuccessful in Adrian Dix when Turpel-Lafond’s report securing another general practitioner in was released. Port Alberni, where there is one family “The fact that so many people around doctor for every 700 residents, according our province, Indigenous people, encounto data from the College of Physicians ter the health care system through the
Inside this issue... Float plane collisions in Tofino.......................................Page 3 Residential school survivors faces past..........................Page 5 First Nation Veterans..............................................Pages 8 & 9 8-year-old child receives COVID shot.........................Page 11 Turning the provincial museum inside out...................Page 15
emergency room and not through primary care is a challenge to our health care system,” he said. “Unfortunately, right now these instances are far too familiar, and nothing is happening with reporting,” stressed Mariah Charleson, vice-president of the Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council. “We’ve seen a Nuu-chah-nulth member, somebody who was in dire need of medical assistance, and they were banned from the West Coast General Hospital.” Poor access to a family doctor is particularly concerning among First Nations people over 65, said Turpel-Lafond. “These elders are not attached to primary care at a rate 89 per cent higher than non-First Nations people in British Columbia – and that, in fact, is quite a staggering finding of this data report,” she commented. “Poor access to primary care may be driving the lower screening rates for treatable cancers.” Comfort with a physician in an institutional setting could already be a challenge for those who attended residential school or an Indian hospital in their youth, noted Charleson. “There’s already that distrust, so if you’re thinking of receiving care and you already have these layers and layers of distrust, it’s going to be really difficult to communicate,” she said. “Many of our people will just refuse to go and get help altogether.” But improvements could be possible through better advocacy to personally help someone navigate through the health care system, something Charleson is pushing for during meetings with First Nations leaders and health officials. “We want to see 24-7 access to an advocate in the hospital for instances like this,” she said. “We think that can go a long way.” After more than a year of struggle, Amos has been referred to a kidney specialist in Victoria, thanks to her connecting with the NTC nursing department. “They were exceptionally helpful, thoughtful,” she said. “I’m wondering why I didn’t turn to them long ago.” As a kidney problem has become the more likely source of Amos’s pain, she has lost a significant amount of weight by cutting down on salt and controlling her diet. “I’m not going to go back to the hospital, because I’m sick and tired of it,” she said. “I want other people to speak up because there’s so many other incidents.” Amos hopes to eventually return to her career of assisting others in long-term care after her health progresses.
If undeliverable, please return to: Ha-Shilth-Sa P.O. Box 1383, Port Alberni, B.C. V9Y 7M2