Editor:
As an advocate for adequate health care for not only seniors like me, but all Sunshine Coasters, I am more than a little concerned that our Sechelt Hospital is not equipped to provide critical stroke care. With the demographic such as it is here on the Coast, I fail to understand why this is not a priority for Vancouver Coastal Health, but apparently it is not.
The responses I have received when I have questioned this situation for the last two years are that they don’t have a radiologist, or they don’t have the MRI diffusion scanner, or they don’t have anyone trained to operate the scanner, or …
If we are to believe the information on television that tells us that the effects of a stroke can be reversed if the drug TPA (tissue plasminogen activator) is administered within three hours, we must also believe that we can be medevaced to Vancouver General Hospital within those three hours. This may happen if it is a calm, clear day, and there is a helicopter available. That said, anyone who has a stroke on a stormy night, and lives in Halfmoon Bay, Madeira Park, Egmont or further has great cause for concern.
We need critical stroke treatment in Sechelt Hospital.
Doreen Henry, Halfmoon Bay
