Petition pleads for Wairoa dementia unit to be kept open

Hawke's Bay District Health Board chief executive Kevin Snee is wanting to consult the community regarding Glengarry House Rest Home's dementia wing. Photo/ file.

Concern around the closure of Glengarry House Rest Home's dementia wing led to a petition being tabled at yesterday's Hawke's Bay District Health Board's board meeting.

The petition was presented to district health board chair Kevin Atkinson by the Dementia Support Group Wairoa earlier this week asking them to consider supporting the unit, despite the owners intentions.

Mr Atkinson said community consultation on the matter would follow and the district health board agreed to continue to fund dementia care beds at the rest home until June 30, so the local Wairoa community could be included in the discussion.

HBDHB strategic services manager Paul Malan said if they closed the facility the patients would have to be integrated into other facilities, which may not be in Wairoa.

"Looking at the statistics, dementia is growing and if these patients can't get care in Wairoa they will have to be drafted into places either north or south of the town."

The petition stated that this was a concern as families could start to keep their loved ones at home "exposing them to neglect and or abuse due to stress and ignorance which they didn't anticipate".

If these patients did leave Wairoa there was concern that their families wouldn't be able to afford visiting them due to travel and time.

Wairoa mayor Craig Little agreed with Mr Malan and said if they lost the facility it would be "disastrous" with people having to leave town to get the care they needed.

"It shouldn't be money that dictates whether we have the ward or not and I think more people will use the facility if we get the message out there that it is a good place to be."

However, Mr Atkinson wondered whether it would be better investing money for a wider purpose.

The district health board funded up to nine fulltime beds in Glengarry's Dementia unit, but only provided funding for beds that were used.

"It was not wise use of resources to put health funding into empty beds. The community needed to think about and be involved in what the future care of dementia patients looked like."

District health board chief executive Kevin Snee said they needed to have this conversation with the community to discuss their needs so they could create a plan.

"We don't want to be on the back foot so we need to find out if there is a better purpose for the money or not."

Mr Malan said if the wing was closed it would be very unlikely it would ever be reinstated.

"I think the dementia unit is an urgent conversation and we need a definitive decision by the end of June as to what is going to happen."

The district health board would be contacting the dementia support group and would formalise consultation, that would include a public meeting in June, which would be advertised.