Questions raised regarding hospital discharge of unhoused B.C. woman in wheelchair

A woman using a wheelchair and her caregiver say they were released from the hospital in Abbotsford despite a lack of shelter, after being treated poorly.

Questions are being raised as to why a woman using a wheelchair and her senior caregiver were discharged from Abbotsford Regional Hospital in B.C., with no home or shelter to return to.

Simone Duttenhoffer and her friend, Peter Hunt, 67, said they went to the ER in Abbotsford in early November.

Duttenhoffer has long had medical issues. They began after she was injured when a vehicle swerved onto a sidewalk in a hit-and-run crash in 2015. Hunt was also injured in the same pedestrian incident.

He recovered, but for Duttenhoffer the crash would have lasting impacts.

“The arthritis has just gotten so severe that… I can’t move. I can’t walk. I can’t stand,” she said.

Hunt became her caregiver.

The pair had been sharing a rental home, but it sold and they weren’t able to find anywhere else to live. They eventually ended up staying in a tent in an Abbotsford park.

“It was devastating,” said Duttenhoffer. “I was either in my wheelchair sitting up, or Peter would lift me down into our sleeping bags.”

But during recent heavy rains, they said the tent flooded.

Duttenhoffer, a recovering addict, said her prescribed pain medications were destroyed along with a street drug she was taking to wean her off heroin.

“My whole body ached, from my back down to my ankles, I was in excruciating pain,” she said.

Hunt had injured his hand while trying to push her wheelchair and both ended up at Abbotsford hospital.

They said staff knew they were homeless, however, the pair was discharged from hospital anyway.

“One of the head nurses said ‘We will pay for your cab to the ministry (of social services). We talked to someone there and they have a place for you to go,’” recalled Duttenhoffer.

But the friends said when they arrived, social services told them no shelter bed had been arranged.

“When we got there, they didn’t know anything about it,” said Duttenhoffer.

With nowhere to go, they eventually called a helpline and were referred to an organization that helps Abbotsford’s homeless.

“Neither one of them had food or money, and the temperatures at night reached 3 C,” recalled Joseph Sikora, director of Ground Zero Ministries.

Sikora said he called all the shelters in Abbotsford and only one had beds available, but even that shelter would not take them.

“They had refused to accept Simone and Peter, basically because of her level of care,” said Sikora.

He said Duttenhoffer was in significant pain, so he took her back to the hospital.

This time, they had the help of a social worker who found supportive housing that would take Duttenhoffer and Hunt who helps her with most everything.

In response to questions from CTV News, Trena Canning, Interim Executive Director at Abbotsford Regional Hospital and Cancer Centre & Mission Memorial Hospital, released a statement.

“We are sorry for the confusion and distress these patients experienced during their time at Abbotsford Regional Hospital. Every patient deserves to feel supported…and we regret that this was not their experience,” the statement read.

“We have reached out to both individuals to listen and apologize for their experience.”

Canning said while limited in what details she could provide, in general, when a person no longer needs to be in the hospital and is ready for discharge, but does not have a home or available housing, care teams provide information and support.

“When discharge planning, we follow established processes to ensure safe and appropriate transitions for patients. Our typical process is to ensure that every discharged patient has a safe and appropriate place to go,” she wrote.

“In situations where individuals are capable of making their own care decisions and indicate they have secured housing, we will support their transition by covering transportation costs, such as a taxi, to help them reach their new home,” the statement read.

“In this case, when we learned that the patients’ housing arrangements had fallen through, we acted quickly upon their return to Abbotsford Regional Hospital to connect both individuals with appropriate housing supports.”

Meanwhile, Duttenhoffer and Hunt said they are grateful to now have the housing they desperately needed, and are thankful for the hospital social worker, several nurses and the outreach team that helped them.