A national advocacy group is calling on the government to make medically assisted induced death available at all facilities across Alberta.
According to Alberta Health Services, between June 2016 and Dec. 31, 2017 a total of 268 Albertans have died with assistance.
Of that number, 37 Albertans have been transferred from faith-based facilities that wouldn’t provide the service. St. Albert has two facilities, Foyer Lacombe and Youville, that do not provide medical assisted death.
Dying with Dignity Canada started a petition on Jan. 12 asking premiers and health ministers across Canada to address the issue.
“In Alberta specifically, Covenant Health is probably the largest publicly-funded institution in the province and they have a policy that MAID can not happen on its premises,” said Brad Peter, director of Dying with Dignity Canada based in Edmonton.
Medically-assisted induced death (MAID) was legalized across Canada in June 2016, though the law allows facilities to decide whether to provide the service.
Faith-based organizations across the country, such as Covenant Health, haven’t adopted the practice, instead transferring patients to other facilities that provide it.
Jacqueline Janelle, spokesperson for Covenant Health, wrote in an email that the organization responds to requests for assisted death by “ensuring a person has access to further information, including third-party assessment of eligibility and, potentially, transfer for provision of medical assistance in dying.”
Peter said transferring a patient isn’t an answer, since transferring from one facility to another can be painful and difficult to organize.
“Patients may have spent years in an institution where they feel comfortable and they feel at home,” he said, “and where they trust their primary care team, their nurses and physicians. In their final moments they’re forced out of that institution and into an unfamiliar place to die.”
He said the organization is leaving solutions up to the provinces, but has offered a couple of options. The government can either stop funding facilities that don’t offer the service, or allow an external physician to come to the facility to perform MAID.
Covenant Health declined an interview and wouldn’t comment on whether the organization would ever allow a physician to come on site and perform assisted death.
Sarah Hoffman, Alberta’s deputy premier and health minister, toured Foyer Lacombe on Jan. 15.
Foyer Lacombe is a hospice and long-term care facility. Its parent company, Covenant Care, is connected to Covenant Health.
She said in an interview at the facility the government has no plans to pull funding from facilities that don’t offer the service.
“I personally feel we’re at a point where today’s system is working quite well and I’m happy with it. We’ll continue to monitor individual situations of course and watch the data as it continues to unroll,” she said.
Hoffman said other provinces are looking to Alberta to tweak their processes in providing the service to residents.
“I think overall most parts of Canada are looking to Alberta and saying ‘Alberta’s leading, Alberta’s got it right."
When it comes to the petition, Hoffman said she understands why Dying with Dignity decided to start it.
“I get it … I think there are some circumstances where we could’ve done a bit better and those are always being reviewed to make sure that we have the most smooth, respectful and ease of transition as we possibly can,” she said.
Covenant Care couldn’t say an exact number in efforts to protect privacy, but did say there have been a few transfers from Foyer Lacombe since June 2016.
Youville, a facility that offers continuing care and supportive living in St. Albert, is operated by Covenant Health. The organization did not say how many transfers have occurred from the facility.
