It was supposed to be a celebratory weekend for Sasha Walek.
Her 65-year-old mother, who was admitted to the ICU in February after suffering renal failure and multiple seizures, was finally on the mend and expected to be sent home Friday. Walek, who lives in New Jersey, drove to Toronto early last week. Her de ella plan de ella: help her mother settle back home, stay to celebrate Mother’s Day on Sunday and drive back stateside the next day.
Instead, the weekend turned into a “COVID-19 nightmare.”
On Tuesday, Walek fell extremely ill and tested positive for COVID-19. Then, her stepfather caught the virus. And yet, Walek says, Hennick Bridgepoint Hospital in Toronto’s east end still insisted on discharging her mother de ella and sending her home Friday to a small two-bedroom condo with two cases of COVID-19.
Now, Walek says she’s searching for answers and wondering how a facility that saved her mother’s life decided to send her to what she calls a “COVID hot zone.”
“I feel dumbfounded,” said Walek, who works in public health communications. “To have them respond in such a way that was just so emotionless — with no flexibility to extend her discharge and no talk of an alternate discharge plan to keep her safe — just boggles my mind.”
Despite begging hospital staff to find another option, Walek said she was told there was no workaround. Her mother’s bed de ella was needed for another patient, Walek was told. Hospital staff said if she and her stepdad wore masks, her mother de ella “would be fine.”
A spokesperson for the Sinai Health System, of which Hennick Bridgepoint Hospital is a member, declined to comment, citing patient privacy concerns. Sinai Health System did not respond to questions from the Star about the hospital’s patient discharge policies.
A spokesperson for the provincial ministry of health said Walek should contact the hospital’s patient relations office or raise the issue with Ontario’s patient ombudsman.
At the last minute on Friday, Walek herself decided to book a hotel room for her mother, rather than risk exposing her to the virus at home. But the situation is not ideal, she said. Her mother de ella, who uses a walker and has received round-the-clock care for nearly three months, will be without a caregiver for the next few days — at least until Walek and her stepdad de ella are out of isolation. In the meantime, Walek said she has friends who are delivering meals to her mother de ella.
“It breaks my heart,” said Walek, who is her mother’s only child.
She doesn’t blame the medical staff and social workers who took care of her mother, some of whom tried to escalate the issue and felt terrible about having to discharge her mother to a COVID-infected household, she said.
“They were all just kind of falling in line. That’s what it seems like,” said Walek.
Instead, she blames the system as a whole for failing people like her mother.
“As a dual US-Canadian citizen who works in health care, all you have to do is watch the news to see the abysmal failures of the US system,” said Walek. “However, I find it shocking to have experienced what I’ve experienced, trying to navigate care here for my mother.”
“I’ve always had so much pride in Canada’s and Toronto’s health-care system. But now my faith has been severely shaken.”
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