The spouse of an individual who passed away after a short terminal illness contacted us to express concerns about the care provided by Health PEI. While the individual recognized that nothing could have stopped the illness, they believed things could have been handled better. The individual explained that Health PEI had mishandled medical information, mismanaged bed-space and had not adequately responded to questions and requests. When they raised these concerns with HealthPEI after their spouse’s passing, they were unsatisfied with the responses provided.
On review of all relevant communications with the individual, we were satisfied that Health PEI had taken accountability for what had happened, offered genuine apologies for its mistakes and had taken meaningful action to prevent similar oversights from recurring. Given the considerable time and effort made by Health PEI staff to respond to the complaints, including apologies directly from senior management, we did not identify any failures in the complaint process.
While solutions to PEI’s healthcare challenges will take time to find and implement, it is important that healthcare providers recognize when things go wrong and take meaningful accountability when they do. Health PEI’s responses to the complainant’s concerns demonstrated that it took this seriously and committed to improving its processes.