Lucie Bruneau rehabilitation centre's survival threatened, users warn

Patients and staff at a rehabilitation centre on the Plateau Mont-Royal say a planned reorganization threatens the very programs and services that help the centre's patients live independently once again.

The Centre Réadaptation Lucie Bruneau cares for people with severe handicaps who no longer need to be in an acute-care hospital setting but need to learn how to adjust to their disability.

• Gaétan Barrette's health care revolution: what you need to know
• Bill 10, controversial health reform bill, passes in National Assembly

The CIUSSS-Centre-Sud-de-l'Île-de-Montréal oversees the Lucie Bruneau centre.

Last month, management told staff and patients it plans on moving several programs to another rehabilitation facility in Cote-des-Neiges.

"I was at first surprised," said Monika Throner, the head of the patients committee for Lucie Bruneau's 8,000 users. "Now I am angry. I am really angry about the whole thing."

Throner is a quadriplegic and did her rehabilitation at Lucie Bruneau. She still uses many of its services and has sat on the board of directors.

In 2011, said Throner, there was talk of streamlining administrative services, but that didn't include taking programs away.

Since Bill 10 was introduced last spring, however, Throner said that's all changed.

Live-in program to close

The Lucie Bruneau centre, nestled in the Plateau on Laurier Avenue, focuses on giving newly disabled patients the skills and confidence they need to adapt to their new lives

There are specialized programs for patients with brain and spinal cord injuries and a live-in residence with 18 wheelchair-accessible rooms, completely renovated a few years ago.

Patients stay there until they are ready to move out on their own. Some of the beds are also used as short-term respite, as needed.

The CIUSSS contends about half the rooms are empty and have been for years. It recently announced the live-in residence at Lucie Bruneau will be closed, and 10 beds will open up at the L'Institut de réadaptation Gingras-Lindsay-de-Montréal, Quebec's largest rehabilitation hospital, in Côte-des-Neiges.

The union which represents the Lucie Bruneau centre's support workers said management is also talking about moving other programs to the larger centre. 

"(If that happens) all that will be left is access to the pool and gym," said union president Sylvie Vendette. "Lucie Bruneau, in a way, will die. If you start to move programs to a place with a more medical orientation, certain services are at risk of disappearing."

'A secure place'

For former patient Stéphanie Keegan, news that the live-in residence is moving is worrisome.

She broke her neck in a 2002 accident that left her with paralysis from the chest down.

"When I went to Lucie Bruneau, it was a whole different world," said Keegan. "You learn to be very independent, to live a life outside, in the world." 

Keegan said the centre felt more like a home than a hospital. Staff pushed residents to try things she never thought she'd ever do - waterskiing, sailing and kayaking.

"It was a secure place with people you know, and so afterwards you can say, I can do that," said Keegan.

At the time, Keegan had a young daughter. She learned how to look after her again, as well as practical skills focused on everything from how to look for a job to how to hire care workers and how to order medication.

Two years after the accident, Keegan was able to move into her own home with her daughter. She said there is no way that would have happened without her experience at Lucie Bruneau.

"I don't know if I would be as happy or free as I am now," said Keegan. "OK, I'm in a wheelchair, that's a bummer, but it's life."

She's skeptical that the caring environment at Lucie Bruneau can be replicated at the much bigger institution, Gingras-Lindsay.

She's worried patients won't get the same attention she got and will end up in an assisted-living facility instead of on their own.

A need to end duplication: CIUSSS

The CIUSSS-Centre-Sud-de-l'Île-de-Montréal said the goal of the planned changes is to provide continuity of services and to get rid of duplication.

Nathalie Charbonneau is its assistant director for physical disabilities.

She defends the changes and said there is broad, ongoing consultation with staff and users. 

She said she doesn't yet have a final tally on which programs will stay and which will disappear, but she insists, while there will be savings, the changes aren't financially driven.  

Charbonneau understands people are nervous.

"The location of some activities, that may change," said Charbonneau. "But the mission, the same quality of services, the services will be offered in the same way they are offered now."

Charbonneau said renovations will need to be done at Gingras-Lindsay to accommodate the live-in residents.

"There will be no transfer before we are sure we can reproduce the same rehabilitation based on social integration," said Charbonneau. "We will not compromise on that."

Throner, however, doesn't put much faith in those promises.

She's made an official complaint about the planned changes. A petition is underway, and protests are planned in the coming weeks.