Quebec is explaining how it will spend $53 million on the island of Montreal in order to get people out of hospitals and into long-term care facilities.

Health Minister Gaetan Barrette announced $100 million funding on Dec. 7, 2016, and came out on Monday, one day before the province's finance minister delivers the provincial budget, to explain how this apparently new money will be spent.

"Many different categories of patients are sitting in hospitals in acute care beds at a time where they are not receiving active care," said Barrette.

In December Barrette announced the province would spend $100 million across Quebec to move those patients into long-term care facilities.

Now he's being precise about how that money will be spent in Montreal.

$34.5 million will go toward area hospitals, each year, in order to get people out of urgent-care beds. Barrette expects this will free up 700 beds in hospitals across the island in a variety of wards.

"Those patients, be it elderly patients, mental health patients, rehab patients and so on, should be in a different facility with different resources in order to recuperate and go back to their previous lives," said Barrette.

To that end, Quebec is budgeting $17 million to create about 350 new jobs at health boards throughout Montreal.

  • Montreal Centre-South CIUSSS: $6.8 million - 135 jobs
  • Montreal East CIUSSS: $4.6 million - 100 jobs
  • Montreal North CIUSSS: $3.2 million - 60 jobs
  • Montreal Centre-West CIUSSS: $1.4 million - 30 jobs
  • West Island CIUSSS: $1.4 million - 25 jobs
  • McGill University Health Centre: $193, 200 - 4 jobs

Emergency rooms in Montreal are frequently crowded and struggle to find places to put patients.

In many cases that is because people go to ERs when it's not necessary, and would be better off going to their family doctor -- or seeing a doctor at a CLSC or similar clinic.

The plan to create more long-term care beds is based on a pilot project that has been running in the Lower St. Lawrence CIUSSS, which saw ER wait times drop from an average of 15 hours to 7.3 hours.

Patient advocate groups say the new money is welcome, but they're hoping for a bigger investment in health care when the provincial budget is delivered on Tuesday.

There are about 53 residences in Montreal, meaning there will be about six or seven people more in each of them. From my point of view, it's not enough to deliver all the services we need,” said Pierre Blain, executive director of the Provincial Grouping of User Committees.

Blain said the money will only make a dent in waiting lists.

“700 beds outside the hospital are not enough, because the lists are very long,” he said.
Blain also said the money doesn't factor in those who care for elderly parents or spouses at home.

“There's really no announcement today for people at home and we feel we should have more investment for that,” he said.

Barrette said still, the province is on the right track and that space and resources in care facilities is getting better.

“There are enough places in long-term care facilities,” he said.