With flu season at hand, Fraser Health is trying out a new way to treat seniors at a New Westminster care facility instead of sending them to hospital.
The health authority is now offering in-house intravenous (IV) therapy at Queen’s Park Care Centre for residents who need it for medications or who’ve become dehydrated because they are too ill to take fluids by mouth.
“There always is more of a need for IV therapy during flu season,” said New West palliative care, and centralized home health services executive director Lisa Zetes-Zanatta. “There’s always higher admissions and admissions related to pulmonary (lung) conditions, and those are the ones we typically treat with IV antibiotics and/or hydration.”
In the past, Queen’s Park seniors in need of IV therapy would have had to be admitted to hospital.
“Certainly, going into hospital is not without some risk because of the change in environment and because of the potential for picking up infections and things like that, so generally it’s better for patients who are frail to get their care in the community or at home rather than in the hospital,” said Dr. Paras Mehta, co-chair of the Fraser Northwest Division of Family Practice, which is partnering with Fraser Health to oversee the initiative.
Transfers to hospital that can last days and sometimes weeks are also costly and take up hospital beds.
On average, a hospital bed costs between $1,200 and $1,500 a day, according to Zetes-Zanatta, while sending a nurse out for one to two hours costs about $160 for two visits, $80 a day for one visit.
IV therapy is now being offered at Eagle Ridge Manor in Port Moody as well as Queen’s Park.
For now, Fraser Health home health nurses are providing the service, but the health authority is also in the process of training nurses at each facility.
The health authority is looking to offer IV therapy in its other owned and operated facilities in the region as well.
Eventually Fraser Health aims to provide the service to people living in their own homes.
