Nunavik health board issues guidelines for patients, escorts in Montreal

You can see all the do’s and don’t’s for Nunavik patients and escorts in Montreal in this new trilingual pamphlet produced by the Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services.

The Nunavik Regional Board of Health and Social Services has produced a trilingual user’s guide to the Northern Quebec Module, which provides patient services to Nunavimmiut in Montreal.

The new pamphlet publicizes the basic rules that beneficiaries and their escorts should respect while they’re in Montreal, the health board said in a recent news release.

These include a list of “obligations and responsibilities” for users and escorts who are advised, among other things, to carry their health insurance card, report for medical appointments, “never possess illegal drug at any time or place” or “possess or drink alcohol at the MNQ [Northern Quebec Module] ‘s transit houses.”

“Never be intoxicated or display disrespectful behavior,” the pamphlet says.

As for escorts, they’re also advised to “place priority on the patient’s welfare and thus be worthy of trust.”

“This will ensure supervision of the MNQ [Northern Quebec Module] users and make their stay at the facility safer,” Larry Watt, the health board’s director of out-of-region services, said in the news release.

The health board also says Nunavik patients and escorts can also report “specific situations” or file complaints with the service-quality and complaints commissioner at 1-888-988-2669.

Copies of the user’s guide are available at the Northern Quebec Module offices in Montreal, the Ungava Tulattavik Health Centre in Kuujjuaq and the Inuulitsivik Health Centre in Puvirnituq.

You can also download an electronic version on the health board’s website.

The facility now used to house Nunavik patients, escorts and patient services is located at the YMCA 0n 4039 Tupper St., not far from the intersection of Atwater St. and St. Catherine St., an area that’s a magnet for homeless people, addicts and drug traffickers.

The health board wants to move the boarding home to the West Island of Montreal, and has been looking at a location there for a new residence.

Plans to transform a vacant Chinese hospital in the Villeray neighbourhood of Montreal were abandoned in September 2010 after months of sometime angry disputes with Anie Samson, the mayor of Villeray, and others in the borough who said they did not want an Inuit patient boarding home in their neighbourhood.

The health board hasn’t yet confirmed which West Island location remains under consideration, but officials have said they hope to have something in place by the end of 2013.

Meanwhile, the YMCA, which also houses the Northern Quebec Module offices, continues to see hundreds of patients and escorts every month.

More than 5,600 patients and escorts stayed there between April 2010 and March 2011.