Dialysis unit to be operating here by spring

After being notified this week that La Verendrye hospital here will get more than $800,000 for a hemodialysis unit, the CEO of Riverside Health Care Facilities Inc. said it hopefully will be operational in the next six months.
“It’s fantastic news for the residents,” Wayne Woods enthused Tuesday. “Those who used to have to travel can now get treatment close to home.
“What we are going to do initially is some work on our existing building to make way for the new unit. A unit like this demands some careful consideration,” said Woods.
“But we’re looking at approximately six months until we get it going.”
The hospital is receiving a one-time grant of $450,950 for a dialysis unit and to provide staff training, as part of a batch of dialysis projects announced Monday by Health minister Elizabeth Witmer.
It also will get $375,000 each year to help cover operating costs.
These operating costs are around $500,000 per year. And the actual unit setup could cost nearly $1 million.
But that’s where Chief Jim Leonard of Rainy River First Nation comes in. Spearheading the local Aboriginal Dialysis Unit Fund, he has helped raise some $450,000 in committed funds–more than $3000,000 of which is now in the bank–to land a dialysis unit here.
“I did talk to Riverside today and more money is needed [than that which the government provided] so we have to keep on fundraising,” Chief Leonard noted Tuesday.
“But the dialysis unit will definitely happen. Positive support is all we have been getting, and I’m very, very happy,” he enthused. “It’s what the district has needed for a long time.”
At least two district residents also were pleased with Monday’s announcement.
Richard and Metta Visser of Emo have been travelling to Thunder Bay Regional Hospital (McKellar site) for her hemodialysis treatment since August, 1999–and even spent a short time living there before moving back to Emo to be close to family and friends.
“It’s good news. You know, driving up there three times a week, each 14-hour days, can wear you down,” Richard Visser said this morning.
“But they told us four or five years ago they were trying to get the funding to have a unit here. That’s we kept travelling and didn’t stay there for good,” he added.
Metta Visser still was resting this morning after yesterday’s trip to Thunder Bay and couldn’t be reached for comment this morning.
Meanwhile, NDP leader and local MPP Howard Hampton also applauded the dialysis unit, which the district has been lobbying to get for more than five years.
“I congratulate all those people in Fort Frances and the Rainy River District who wrote letters, signed petitions, and came forward on a personal basis to tell their story about how much a dialysis unit is required,” he said in press release issued yesterday.
“I’ll be doing everything I can to make sure this happens as soon as possible,” he pledged. “We have to move on this now. People have waited far too long for this unit.
“The sooner it’s operational, the sooner people can stop travelling to Thunder Bay three times a week for dialysis,” Hampton noted.