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Letter To Ih Board

The letter addresses issues of racism, mental health stigmatization, and lack of confidentiality experienced by clients at Creston Valley Hospital. It calls for better mental health training for staff, more readily available mental health nursing, and an investigation into treatment of minority and mental health patients.

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0% found this document useful (0 votes)
70 views1 page

Letter To Ih Board

The letter addresses issues of racism, mental health stigmatization, and lack of confidentiality experienced by clients at Creston Valley Hospital. It calls for better mental health training for staff, more readily available mental health nursing, and an investigation into treatment of minority and mental health patients.

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This letter is intended to address, and bring attention to, the quality of care that individuals are receiving

in the Creston Valley Hospital; particularly in the Emergency department. We appreciate our health care
workers. However, racism and mental health stigmatization continues to be very prevalent in our
hospital.

We, as an agency, have had clients enter the hospital and be sent away and told that it is all in their
heads. We have had clients go in for help and had the RCMP called on them because they are
Indigenous and/or people of colour. We have had clients go in with severe anxiety, depression, or other
mental health concerns and been told that their experiences are not valid, and that they are faking their
symptoms. We recognize that mental health is a difficult issue to deal with and mitigate, but feel that
hospital staff, in their turn, need to have compassion for the fact that the last place people want to be in
the midst of a mental health crisis is in an emergency department, particularly not one where they feel
they are disregarded and judged for their illness.

On several occasions we have been present in the Emergency department with clients and have
overheard staff talking amongst themselves about the clients we are with. Our clients have heard
themselves referred to as frequent fliers, that they are there “again”, and that staff don’t know what
they are expected to do with them. There seems to be an overall lack of awareness amongst personnel
in the Emergency department that the space is not soundproof. When they are talking about an
individual’s condition openly, it is a complete disregard of their patients’ right to confidentiality.
Particularly considering Creston is a small community, where many people know one another. Thus,
when there are personal conversations between staff members about patients’ health, they need to be
discussed in a more private space.

There have been attempts to have communication with supervisors of varying departments to have
constructive conversation about the care of our clients, and to help create plans of support around
them. Those plans have been inconsistently followed, or ignored completely.

This letter is intended as a call for action to the Board of Directors at the Interior Health Authority, for
the Creston Valley Hospital. There needs to be better mental health awareness and training for the
hospital staff (nurses, doctors, etc.,) as well as looking into the possibility of having mental health
nursing more readily available Additionally, mental health support for all of the staff at the hospital is
needed – particularly in light of the CoVid-19 pandemic. We feel that these issues warrant an
investigation into the treatment of mental health and minority patients at Creston Valley Hospital.

Finally, we would like to acknowledge that it is not our intention to call out every staff member in the
Emergency department. We are aware of and thankful for those employed at our hospital who are
amazing and go above and beyond every day for their patients, however, as in any such situation it only
takes one or two individuals to cast a negative light over an entire operation.

We would be pleased to address our concerns in person before the Board if it is possible and
appropriate to do so. We hope that this letter can be taken in the spirit in which it was intended; to
raise awareness and help to make our hospital a welcoming, non-judgmental and effective place of
healing for our whole community. Thank you for your time and consideration in this matter. We look
forward to your feedback.

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