Edmonton facility will offer transition beds to discharged ER patients who are homeless

Homeless people in Edmonton who have been discharged from hospital emergency departments will now have a place to recover.

The Bridge Healing Transitional Accommodation Program is designed to improve health outcomes for patients who have sought care in hospital emergency departments across the Edmonton region.

The program, with 36 transition beds spread across three buildings at 160th Street and 100th Avenue, will provide people without a home a clean, safe place to recover from illness or injury.

Clients will get appropriate community supports, including housing, physical health, and mental health and addiction services.

Lengths of stay will vary depending on the patients' needs.

The program is the first of its kind in the country, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said during a news conference Thursday.

"Many of us take for granted the ability to return from the hospital to a warm and safe home where we can recuperate," Smith said.

"For homeless Albertans, this is not an option, so their healing may be hampered by the harsh conditions that they live in."

The program is a partnership between Alberta Health Services and Jasper Place Wellness Centre, a non-profit organization that helps some of the city's most vulnerable.

Each of the three buildings will have 12 beds. The first 12 will open this month. 

AHS will provide about $1 million annually in operational funding — $80 per day for each of the 36 beds, AHS spokesperson Kirsten Goruk said in an emailed statement.

The Jasper Place Wellness Centre funded construction and land costs, Goruk said. Each building cost $1.3 million, she said.

Smith said the program could begin accepting its first clients as soon as this week. 

In helping some of the most vulnerable populations in the city, it will also have benefits for the wider health-care system, Smith said.

"Providing people with housing after they are discharged from an emergency department means that they have one less thing to worry about while they're healing," she said.

"This also means that beds in the emergency department open up for other patients. 

"There are significant demands on our emergency departments and this partnership will serve the dual benefits of improving health outcomes while also ensuring that wait times are improved." 

Discharge plans for eligible patients will be co-ordinated between hospital staff and workers at Jasper Place Wellness Centre, Health Minister Jason Copping said.

The number of people struggling with poverty and homelessness continues to surge in Edmonton, pushing the city's shelter system past capacity this winter. 

The city estimates there are upwards of 2,800 people in Edmonton experiencing homelessness, with around 800 individuals sleeping outside on any given night.

Taylor Soroka, co-founder of the Jasper Place Wellness Centre, said clients housed in the beds will be offered permanent housing options along with other support programs in the community.

Built-in resources will be offered on site, including referrals to detox and residential treatment programs, she said.

A pilot with possibility

Soroka said the program has been in the works for more than three years. She thanked facility staff and government officials for making it a reality.

The program should be used as a model for transitional housing across Alberta, she said. 

"This is definitely a pilot project, so we want to prove out that the model works," Soroka said. 

"Historically speaking, from a transitional housing perspective, we know it will work, but as an accommodation program with Alberta Health Services, let's prove it out and then grow."

Dr. Louis Francescutti, an emergency physician and long-time health-care advocate, said too often, patients have been discharged from hospital with nowhere to go. 

"In the past, historically, for whatever reason, patients that have presented in their most vulnerable state received access to the top medical care they could probably receive and then unfortunately, we had to turn them back into the street," Francescutti said.

"What we're doing here today is historic. It's never been done in Canada and I think it'll set a new standard."

He said overwhelming numbers of people experiencing homelessness visit emergency departments each year.

He said the annual total in Alberta is equivalent to the combined populations of Jasper, Canmore and Banff. The Royal Alexandra Hospital in central Edmonton "takes the brunt of it" with 8,800 visits a year, he said. 

Francescutti said the program will help ease pressure on emergency departments and improve patient outcomes. 

"When I go to work today and I see one of my homeless patients, I can't wait to say, 'Hang in there buddy, one more week and I've got a place to send you.'"