Vernon senior desperate for care home placement, pleas seemingly ignored

04/05/2019

After suffering back-to-back heart attacks last Christmas, Joseph Gaudry can barely take care of himself at his Vernon home.

Outings to get simple groceries are nearly impossible, he said, and he has no family to help.

“It took me an hour with my walker too go out there,” Gaudry told Global News. “I dropped it once. I knelt down to pick up stuff. Once I get down that far I couldn’t get up so I ended up going back on my back and it took forever for somebody to come by to help me get up.”

Due to his physical and mental needs following the health crisis, the 78-year-old was told by medical professionals he needed to be placed in a care facility.

But nothing has happened in three months.

“I can’t do nothing that is why I need help,” he said.

“I can’t take no more.”

An Interior Health (IHA) spokesperson could not offer comment on Gaudry’s case due to privacy.

“Part of our responsibility is to advocate for people as well,” IHA’s Angela Szabo said. “When we are working with individuals we want to insure that they receive the best supports to meet their needs in the community so we would share with that individual all the resources that are available to them”

Gaudry is visited on occasion by IHA nurses but he said that isn’t enough and he’s become exasperated waiting for proper medical assistance.

“I need to get out of here that’s the big point,” he said. “Extended care is what they said they’d take care of. So each time I phone I get angry like this and I’m getting more and more that I have to hangup because I can’t take their baloney.”

Gaudry hopes reaching out will remind IHA that he desperately needs help.

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