Alberta’s shortage of senior housing beds could grow to 10,000 within a decade, Coun. Michael Diachuk told council Monday, citing figures from a recent mid-size cities summit.
Diachuk attended the Alberta Mid-Size Cities Mayor’s Caucus summit on behalf of Mayor Gerald Aalbers, along with the city manager and an intergovernmental affairs staffer.
He said the province currently has about 1,400 hospital patients waiting for alternate level care, down from 1,700. Some have waited five years for a bed elsewhere.
“When you look at it, the cost per day in hospitals is around $3,000 and change,” said Diachuk. “The cost in a lodge or other facility is $3,000 roughly a month.”
About a third of those patients are seniors, Diachuk said. Alberta’s current senior bed deficit sits at 3,000, and is projected to grow to about 10,000 over the next 10 years.
Diachuk connected the shortage to the city’s own review of Pioneer Lodge and a possible replacement of part of the facility.
Many of the city’s senior housing buildings date to the 1980s and are nearing the end of their functional life, he said.
At the summit, Diachuk raised the issue directly with Alberta’s health minister and pressed the province’s transportation minister on the Lloydminster airport. He also attended a doctor recruiting event two weeks earlier with Kagan Kneen, CEO of the Lloydminster Region Health Foundation, where the city competed alongside Melfort, Tisdale, Nipawin and Meadow Lake to attract new physicians.
Diachuk said one presenter at the summit described a stark outlook for smaller municipalities.
“Their answer was the only way you can kind of get ahead is by scaling up,” said Diachuk. “So if you’re not getting big, you’re going home.”
He also relayed an example from a councillor in Cold Lake, Alberta, whose community is financing its own health care solution. The community is building its own clinic and set up a loan for a doctor to purchase an MRI machine, to be repaid over time, rather than wait on provincial funding.
No motion was required on the report.
Read more: Lloydminster Concerned Citizens for Seniors Care
