Fraser Health is opening a community transitional housing at a local motel in Surrey for discharged patients “who no longer require hospital care but still need ongoing support,” the health authority says.
The site will open Monday (Dec. 28) at the newly renovated George Point Inn (9414 King George Boulevard), just down the road from Surrey Memorial Hospital. The site will gradually scale up to provide around-the-clock care to 53 people.
“Services will include psychosocial supports, medication management and rehabilitation in a supportive, home-like environment. Nurses will monitor clients’ medical concerns,” reads a Fraser Health news release.
Dr. Marietta Van Den Berg, psychiatrist and interim site medical director at Surrey Memorial Hospital, said the use of transitional housing is not new. It has been around since the 1990s in Europe, where it is called patient hotels, she added.
Van Den Berg explained that sometimes patients stay longer than they need in a hospital “because we are unable to transition them either to home or to a long-term care facility or wherever it is that they can safely go.”
These are the patients that Fraser Health will be looking after at the community transitional housing, Van Den Berg said, adding that what all of these patients have in common is that they no longer need acute hospital care.
“Some might be waiting for a rehab bed, or some a long-term care bed, or some maybe need changes to be made at their homes before they can go home.”
While Van Den Berg said she does not believe this will solve Surrey Memorial Hospital’s overcrowding problem, it will benefit two groups of patients – the patients who no longer need to be in the hospital but still have an alternative level of care, and the patients in the emergency department who need an acute care bed.
“So it will help a little bit, but it is only one of a whole range of measures that we have to take,” Van Den Berg said.
The community transitional housing is a part of “30 promised health care actions” Health Minister Adrian Dix announced in June.
“As part of our promise to expand services in Surrey, this unique transitional housing environment will ensure eligible vulnerable patients benefit from a continuum of care after they no longer require hospital services, keeping them connected to the health support services they need,” Dix stated in a Fraser Health release Wednesday (Dec. 13).
READ MORE: Help coming to ease strain at Surrey Memorial Hospital, Dix announces
In November, Fraser Health installed portables to be used as a “temporary pediatric emergency waiting area” outside Surrey Memorial Hospital to prepare for potential surges during respiratory illness season. This was also part of Dix’s “30 promised healthcare actions.”
READ MORE: Surrey hospital installs temporary pediatric emergency waitroom
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