Experts look to diagnose the toll of homelessness on health care

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ER doctors and nurses have become a frequent point of contact for people without shelter – but a lack of data makes it harder to measure and address the crisis

In the emergency department at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton, Dr. Louis Hugo Francescutti recently treated a patient who was homeless and was there for the 360th time.

But doctors and nurses are not obligated to ask patients about their housing status, so this information is not always making it onto those charts in the first place – meaning the picture is incomplete. “Housing status, and in particular homelessness, is a huge determinant of health. It has a huge impact on people’s health, and a huge impact on their use of health services,” Keith Denny, CIHI’s director of Population and Indigenous Health, and Classifications and Terminologies,In those four years since it was mandated, Mr. Denny said, CIHI has seen an improvement in the capture of the data. But it’s far from perfect, and varies from hospital to hospital, and from province to province.

“When you admit someone to hospital, you do take a fairly complete history and describe where they live and who’s living with them,” said Dr. Stephen Hwang, a general internistand one of the world’s leading researchers on homelessness, housing and health. “But you don’t do that in the emergency department, necessarily.”

Dr. Hwang says social factors play a huge role in a patient’s health, and are critical to assess on a systemic level.

 

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Carla72242850 ...while drastically increasing immigration.

Let's bring in more people. That'll help for sure.

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