GORE BAY—The Town of Gore Bay and Jarlette Health Services has entered into preliminary discussions with St. Joseph’s Health Centre in Sudbury about the future of the Manitoulin Lodge Nursing Home.
“As announced in Gore Bay on March 21, Manitoulin Lodge and the Town of Gore Bay are in discussions about the future of the long-term care (LTC) home,” reads a joint statement by the Town of Gore Bay and Manitoulin Lodge last Thursday. “At the announcement, it was stated that in Ontario, redevelopment of any LTC home is a lengthy process. The redevelopment of Manitoulin Lodge will involve many community partners from throughout Manitoulin Island, the provincial health-care system and government, as we clarify our vision for the future home and identify groups which could help us realize our vision.”
“To that end, the Town of Gore Bay and Jarlette Health Services has entered into preliminary discussions with St. Joseph’s Health Centre in Sudbury. These discussions are exploratory, at the earliest stages, and no agreement has been struck.”
“We are very pleased that this has happened and we hope it will proceed,” Gore Bay Mayor Ron Lane told The Expositor. “It was somewhat indirect information channels that we heard St. Joseph’s may be interested in the redevelopment of our nursing home.” He said the town has bi-weekly meetings with Jarlette Health Services representatives and has had one meeting with St. Joseph’s officials as well as exchanging emails.
“Our three-way discussions have been opened up,” said Mayor Lane, who noted these discussions are very preliminary and exploratory and no firm decisions have been made. It is important for us that St. Joseph’s has significant presence in long term care. They own two LTC facilities and they used to own and operate the Sudbury General Hospital.”
“As we had said at the initial announcement in March this process will take awhile. So, while this is good news the discussions are preliminary and we can’t say any agreement has been reached,” said Mayor Lane. “And we said previously we would let the community know when any changes have been made.”
St. Joseph’s Health Centre is a non-profit agency corporation, “and non-profit is what we have said all along we wanted. At the beginning Jarlette approached us to make sure that the nursing home would stay in Gore Bay. In our discussions with St. Joseph’s they want to keep the LTC home in Gore Bay as well.”
Mayor Lane said Manitoulin Island and Sudbury have a close relationship in the view of health care services. “It makes sense to have an entity like St. Joseph’s Health Centre involved, it is a perfect fit to operating a long-care nursing home. This is good news.”
Kari Gervais, president and chief executive officer of St. Joseph’s Health Centre told The Expositor, “The mission of St. Joseph’s Health Centre has always been focused on meeting the unmet needs of the community and caring for society’s most vulnerable. We already provide long-term care services to 128 residents each at St. Joseph’s Villa of Sudbury and Villa St. Gabriel’s Villa in Chelmsford (in addition to operating 128 rehabilitation and transitional care hospital beds spread across two sites of St. Joseph’s Continuing Care Centre in Sudbury) and we are happy to support the efforts of Manitoulin Lodge and the Town of Gore Bay to keep long-term care alive and well in that community.”
“St. Joseph’s Health Centre was contacted by a mutual colleague who thought there might be a partnership opportunity between St. Joseph’s Health Centre, the Town of Gore Bay and Manitoulin Lodge,” said Ms. Gervais.
“We will keep our community informed if there is more information to share,” the joint release said. “It should be noted that in our journey towards identifying potential partners, community members may hear of other discussions.”
“The Town of Gore Bay, Manitoulin Lodge and St. Joseph’s Health Centre have been vocally advocating that LTC services should remain within the community of Gore Bay to ensure that residents and families of Manitoulin Island continue to be well served and that the home he elevated to an ever stronger position for redevelopment.”
“We remain committed to providing regular updates to residents, family members and team members and community stakeholders throughout this lengthy process.”
