Evidence of meeting #19 for Veterans Affairs in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was therapists.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
David Sweet Conservative Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON
Another occupational therapist does not have that advantage, has no military experience, so give me an idea about that.
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
I have an excellent example of this happening two months ago. I typically don't share, if I don't need to, that I'm a military spouse. I can talk their lingo, first of all. I can tell what they've done, and it's amazing how you can build rapport because of that.
I walked into a gentleman's home. He is 92 and can barely walk. He is very enthusiastic. His wife is a veteran as well. They live together in a cute little suite. I went through my whole spiel and didn't talk about combat at this point. I was about to leave and I saw a plaque on the wall. I thanked him for his service and told him it was wonderful. He was a fighter pilot or a mechanic of some sort. He sat down on the walker I had just provided him with—thank you very much, Veterans Affairs—and he started crying. Obviously this had happened before, because his wife didn't react.
He looked at me and said, “I need to tell you something. I need you to know that a young girl came to him and said I had grieving issues, and she went through this whole spiel about how to grieve properly. I just want to tell you a little bit about myself. When I was in the war, I sat at a table with all these other pilots, and then we went out the next day and half of them were gone. We ate at that table, and then they were gone. She came and talked to me about all these ways of grieving so I could deal with it.” He said to me—and I couldn't have said it better—“I need you to know, and I need health nurses to know”—he didn't know what an occupational therapist was—“that we as soldiers grieve differently. We don't use the same services. We don't use the same techniques as civilians would use.” I looked at him and thought, thank you very much for putting it into perspective.
That is exactly what I am trying to say here. Whether or not health professionals are going in, he didn't respond to it. He had all of it. He was there. He knew it. He heard the techniques. But he said he needed something else that was military, soldier-specific, to teach him about grieving—how to grieve at the age of 92, after losing six men, after coming back from war.
They're still worried about that. If you want to know if veterans who are 80 years old have any kind of trauma exposure, ask them how they're sleeping, because what's going to come out is whether or not they are tossing and turning and having nightmares. I don't want my husband at the age of 80 tossing and turning, so I have to sleep in another bed. Some of these veterans' wives sleep in separate rooms because the veterans cry out at night.
I work with a veteran who is 50 years old. He is incontinent at night because he still has nightmares about being on fire and he cannot get out of his bed. These are things they are still dealing with at this time, but what do we do with that? I don't know.
I just put in an application to do research to seek out information on veteran-specific occupational therapy techniques for mental health, and I'm going to do a full literature review to find out what people are using right now for veterans of all ages. Obviously it's not working. I shouldn't say it's not working, because I know that it is, but there are little gaps, and we need to find them.
I hope that answers your question.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Rob Anders
Always when I say we've had our last question, of course that spurs others. Now we are on to the Liberal Party of Canada, the official opposition, Mr. Valley, for five minutes.
Liberal
Roger Valley Liberal Kenora, ON
I have a very quick question. We're having a little debate, and this is a new committee. We debate around here about who is our responsibility. I thought I heard you say something, so I want to ask you specifically.
My impression is that when you sign on with the armed forces you become a client of ours because you're going to get to be a veteran. Would you share that? You pointed out your husband, and I took it to mean he'll be our responsibility eventually.
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
Dare I say I think he's your responsibility now—
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
—because I do believe there are some veterans like us...and when I say “veteran” in this sense, I mean a veteran like my husband. When we leave the base, we're not near anything. We're not near services. We don't have the military family resource centre at the BCDs in Kelowna. He doesn't have medical treatment. One gentleman who moved out at the same time as he did, as a regular force, hasn't had his teeth checked in two years.
So dare I say that I feel Veterans Affairs should be responsible for those couple of soldiers. There aren't many, but there are a couple of us who move so frequently that we need that support.
Liberal
Roger Valley Liberal Kenora, ON
That's what we noticed when we travelled to the bases, and we have a couple more bases that we're going to right away. That's what the people who are enlisted right now, who are serving right now, seem to believe, that we're going to be there looking after them—
Liberal
Roger Valley Liberal Kenora, ON
—so they want impact right now.
That's all I had to ask. Thank you very much again for your service. Thank you for enlightening us and thank you for looking after us.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Rob Anders
Thank you, sir.
Now, Mr. Cannan, I believe you wanted to make some closing remarks.
Conservative
Ron Cannan Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to thank Helen and Captain Mike for coming together and for this opportunity to share their experience and their vision of how we can look after our veterans, as men and women who have served, who are serving, and who continue to serve, and those who are in retirement.
It's not hard to get engaged in your compassion and your enthusiasm for this issue. You talked about the whole holistic and multi-disciplinary approach and about coming with a seamless transition—between Veterans Affairs and working with Health Canada—and a more cost-competitive approach. You've done a very extensive brief here. Have you actually looked at costing it out to see what kinds of dollars we're looking at?
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
No, I haven't. That's definitely not my area. I come as a front-line worker, and I definitely don't have the expertise to look at cost-effectiveness. I assume it would be more cost-effective to use the resources that are already there instead of creating new ones. I think that would be more cost-efficient.
Service manuals. You have the information. Put them together. Assign someone to get it and get them out there. I think service manuals would be less than creating a whole different website and getting one person to walk around and do services, etc.
So no, I haven't, but if you wanted to do that for me, that would help my case.
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
Ron, will you do that for me?
Conservative
Ron Cannan Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
You're great at delegating.
As mentioned by some of my colleagues, the aspect of skilled labour shortages was raised. For occupational therapists, is there a good intake, and what's the timeline for somebody to enter the program and graduate?
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
If you do it as long as I have, it's taken an extreme amount of resources and a couple of tours to get me through, but it's been eight years of full-time school. Right now the timeline for occupational therapists to go through, I believe, is four years—it's getting more competitive—and then two years to do your master's as a clinical occupational therapist. There are outlines there now that the Canadian Forces can use, just taking into consideration physiotherapists and social workers who are already being put through the system as military personnel. I think the system is already there; we just need to open that up to occupational therapists.
Is that what you were asking?
Conservative
Ron Cannan Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Yes.And right now Veterans Affairs does not have any OTs on staff?
Occupational Therapist and military spouse, As an Individual
Yes, they do. As I mentioned in the opening, Veterans Affairs in the Okanagan has Carole Kennedy, who's the rehabilitation assistant. She also has the contract for district occupational therapists and she gives out referrals. She has got on the rehabilitation team.
I can't really speak too much about the rehabilitation team. I really would recommend the committee look into it, because that health care team is what the new releasing members are going to be using. I would love to see somebody look into it because I'd like to know more about it. I'm not sure if there are any occupational therapists in other districts across Canada on the rehabilitation team. If there aren't, I'd put it out as a recommendation, that there should be an occupational therapist on the rehabilitation team who's connected to the Canadian Forces team. Hypothetically there's an OT in the forces at that point, they connect up together, and it's those two who are actually being used to create the treatment plan.
Conservative
Ron Cannan Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
That's what I was wondering. That's where you get that seamless plan.
Conservative
Ron Cannan Conservative Kelowna—Lake Country, BC
Okay, thank you. It's all coming together.
And I'd like to thank your mom and your sister for their support as well, for coming all the way from London, Ontario, today. So thank you.
And happy birthday, Mike.