City council pressing province to look at mental health services in Cold Lake

Cold Lake city council is trying to press the provincial government to look at the lack of mental health resources in the city and by extension the Lakeland region.

City council gave the green light to write a letter to the Minister of Health and Alberta Health Services, requesting a discussion in regards to establishing mental health services at the Cold Lake Healthcare Centre.

“Right now, if you need to stay overnight, you have to go to St. Paul and Fort McMurray, so we want to try and encourage the government to put more money into the Cold Lake Hospital, and to look at expanding that hospital or repositioning,” said Mayor Craig Copeland.

“But definitely try to get some beds in the hospital and increase the staffing. The staff are to the max in dealing with mental health issues.”

The RCMP under the Mental Health Act can spend hours on the road transporting mental health patients to the nearest facilities in St. Paul or Fort McMurray, the Mounties told city council during their yearly report.

The mental health services that are available at the Healthcare Centre are full, said Copeland.

“The issue in Cold Lake is mental health just like across Canada, but the staff that is dealing with mental health in our community are doing a fabulous job. What we want them to do is for them to lobby for more beds, overnight stays, so that people can get the much-needed help here in Cold Lake.”

He adds that the northeast region seems to be forgotten when it comes to health and transportation services from the province.

“This whole area is forgotten. You go around the rest of the province and it doesn’t matter which government you’re talking about, they’ve invested in other areas of the province.

“This area for whatever reason for those two ministries, have really lacked significant funding and we’re hoping that Cold Lake is going to be the area where the province is really going to start to invest.”

Issues do not go away

However, the issue of proper care does not go away when patients are transported.

The closest mental health service, St. Paul’s St. Therese Healthcare Centre, is fraught with issues regarding the number of psychiatrists and bed availabilities as well.

Bonnyville-Cold Lake-St. Paul MLA David Hanson quizzed Associate Minister of Mental Health and Addictions Jason Luan about improving patient care and wrap around services.

“Given that many patients from other communities are brought into our facility, often by the RCMP, but upon discharge have no means of returning to their hom ecommunity, sometimes with no ID or no money, and given that the previous Minister’s reponse to local mayors was ‘that was a municipalities problem’ – Minister, will you work with the mayor and council to come up with a more realistic solution?”

Luan said he looked forward to doing so.

City council approved the letter to Tyler Shandro Minister of Health at last Tuesday’s regular meeting.