b'PARTNERS IN CAREEssential care partnersare indeed essentialBuilding resilience and support through family caregiversBy James ConklinW e all know about theand during future waves of frontline workers in long-term care. extraordinary challengesthe pandemic.When families could not enter long-that have afflicted theterm care, we heard that resident long-term care sector since MarchHEC also offered funding to supportbehaviours such as wandering and 2020. Faced with an unprecedentedteams of scientists and other expertsaggressiveness increased. At the same emergency, policy makers initiallyto form alliances with long-termtime, long-term care staff found that tried to protect our elderly in long- care homes to help them implementnew responsibilities were added to term care by imposing strict visitationimprovements and to report on theirtheir already busy basic care routines. rules. This meant that long-term careexperiences. Our team, made up ofAs these policies were put in place, residents did not have the support andseveral Ontario scientists, leaders andthe situation became increasingly care they usually received from familystaff at three Ontario long-term caredifficult in some homes.and close friends.homes, and family members and long-term care experts, was awardedWe are now in a position to share In the summer of 2020, Healthcarefunding to help implement andwhat we have learned. Excellence Canada (HEC), anevaluate a Designated Care Partner independent not-for-profit charity(DCP) program that would allow twoStarting in the fall of 2020, as the DCP funded by Health Canada, conductedfamily members to come back intoprogram was implemented, families a study that identified seven promisingthe homes to support their could once again safely enter the practices that could improve theloved ones. long-term care homes to care for their situation in long-term care homes.loved ones. We heard touching stories One of these practices called for theOver the past year, my team hasabout the first time families entered re-integration of family caregivers ininvestigated the importance ofthe homes. We heard about the long-term care homes. By the earlyensuring that families could safelyhappiness of an elderly woman when fall of 2020, the province of Ontariovisit their relatives living in Ontarioshe realized the person in front of her, announced a policy to bring at leastlong-term care homes. We heardpartly hidden behind a mask and face some family back into long-term caremany worrying stories about declinesshield, was her daughter. We heard homes to reduce the negative impactin resident health and well-being,about an elderly man in a wheelchair of social isolation on residents beforeand about the challenges faced bywho excitedly tried to get to his feet 36 LONG TERM CARE TODAY Spring/Summer 2022'