Frustration boils over in Steinbach over lack of homeless support

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Advocates for the homeless say their frustration with mental health services in Steinbach has reached a boiling point, after a disturbing incident caused “chaos” at a Steinbach emergency room recently.

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Irene Kroeker is the executive director of Steinbach Community Outreach (SCO) an organization that supports those in need in the southeastern Manitoba city of more than 17,000 residents.

“When you are working with homeless people, you are obviously working with people that need mental health services, and that is where we really struggle,” Kroeker said.

“We don’t seem to find a way to access the mental health systems, and we have tried everything and it’s so frustrating. Everyone is frustrated.”

SCO has struggled for years to get appropriate mental health services for the homeless and Kroeker said he had to speak out after a disturbing incident at Steinbach’s Bethesda Regional Health Centre on Sept. 23.

“We had someone in a crisis and they were having what looked like a full-on psychotic episode, and it was really scary because we know this person very well, and this was not how she normally acts, and we knew she needed some treatment,” she said.

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Kroeker said there is a crisis stabilization unit in Steinbach that can be accessed, but she said after that it can take hours or days to get someone into treatment, because those who need an assessment to receive treatment often have to get it at Steinbach’s hospital, and in many cases have to wait long hours in a waiting room, even if they are in the depths of a severe mental health episode.

“So we went to the ER, and here she is having an episode in the middle of a packed waiting room with families and children and seniors,” Kroeker said.

“And she’s screaming about people she thinks are stalking her and talking in great detail about past sexual abuse, and it is just causing total chaos in the hospital and scaring the people. It was just horrible for everyone.”

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She added those who go to an ER for mental health emergencies are typically the least urgent matter for those deciding who gets care and how quickly they get care, and the women having an episode eventually gave up and left without even being diagnosed.

“We waited seven or eight hours because they deal with the physical needs first, and mental health needs have to wait, and this is not the way things should work.”

And because she was not able to access treatment at the ER, Kroeker said the woman spent days after leaving the hospital wandering the streets.

“So we have this girl who needs treatment and everyone knows she needs treatment, and she’s back on the streets for three days, she doesn’t even have shoes on, and she’s in such a state that she can’t even process or rationalize.”

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Kroeker said they were able to get the woman into treatment after more than three days, but said they were forced to take her to an ER in another region, and forced to do some “begging.”

“We had to do some begging, but they did keep her in,” she said.

But she worries that some that can’t get treatment for days could end up resorting to self-harm or suicide, end up harming others, or go so deep into a psychotic episode that they refuse treatment even when it becomes available.

“It is just frustration at every step of the system,” Kroeker said. “The nightmare continues.”

Kroeker said one thing she might now suggest to Southern Health, the local health authority in the region, would be to have separate waiting rooms in ERs for those with mental health issues to avoid episodes like what she said happened this week.

But she said there also needs to be a “serious conversation” in the region about finding ways to get those who are in a mental health emergency faster access to doctors, diagnosis and treatment.

The Winnipeg Sun reached out to Southern Health for comment, but did not receive a response.

— Dave Baxter is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter who works out of the Winnipeg Sun. The Local Journalism Initiative is funded by the Government of Canada.

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