Winnipeg man decries 'degrading and dehumanizing' lack of palliative home care for partner

When Katherine Ellis decided to come home for palliative care last month after being diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer, she thought she'd be comfortable, spending her final days surrounded by loved ones.

Instead, the 62-year-old Winnipeg woman has been lying in the same bedsheets for weeks without more than a sponge bath because the help she was promised never arrived, her partner of a decade said.

"The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority, despite a lot of promises, has been unable to provide ... home care workers," Eric De Schepper, 58, said on Thursday.

For nearly five weeks now, De Schepper said that has meant his common law spouse's caregiving has been left solely to him, even though he can't help her out of bed or fully bathe her on his own.

He said he's asked their palliative care co-ordinator weekly for the home care they were supposed to get and was told they don't have the resources to send workers.

"I'd like to ask anybody, challenge anybody, how would you feel after being treated for four weeks like that? It's just degrading and dehumanizing," De Schepper said.