There’s much to learn about BC’s laws and eldercare system from the last years of Kathleen Palamarek’s life in a local nursing home—especially from the battles that were fought in her name between her children, care providers and the Vancouver Island Health Authority. It was a small but important epitaph for a much-loved woman.
Data obtained through a Freedom of Information request shows nearly half of all seniors in long-term care in BC are being given antipsychotics like Risperdal, Zyprexa and Seroquel. That’s almost twice the average for the rest of Canada and amongst the highest rates found anywhere in the world. And even though Health Canada warns these
At 88, Dr. Abram Hoffer is still dispensing wise nutritional advice and damning critiques of our health care system. On beginnings, orthomolecular medicine, psychedelic research, a revolutionary treatment for schizophrenia, and the state of present-day psychiatric care. No Canadian psychiatrist has been simultaneously more dogged by controversy and more beloved by his patients than Victoria’s
What killed 13-year-old Mercedes-Rae Clarke after she ingested an unknown drug she bought on the street? We won’t know until the coroner’s investigation concludes-if ever. But the day after her death in September, that didn’t stop our regional chief medical officer Dr. Richard Stanwick, Victoria police inspector Clarke Russell, and even coroner Lisa Lapointe from
Originally published in Monday Magazine, 1998. Connected to 2008 story, "Our Government's Deliberate Helplessness". A FORMER chief of psychiatry at Eric Martin Pavilion psychiatric hospital whose licence was permanently revoked in Ontario after he was found to have drugged and repeatedly sexually assaulted a patient, is currently practising in Victoria. Dr. Frank Gordon Johnson worked