For-profit home care corporation settles lawsuit for bad care

Comcare, one of Canada's largest for-profit home care providers, must pay more than $800,000 toward the lifetime care of a disabled Kitchener girl injured by its care.

The child's parents sued Comcare after a former Comcare nurse was convicted of aggravated assault for abusing their baby girl, Leandra Knarr, over several months in the spring of 2002. The already handicapped baby was 20 months old when Comcare began to provide overnight care so the couple could sleep.

A home videotape showed the nurse punching and slapping the baby in the head and chest, pulling her from her crib by her hair and pushing her hand down on her face as though suffocating her. She violently twisted her limbs, resulting in three fractured limbs.

Along with Comcare, the parents also sued the Community Care Access Centre (CCAC) of Waterloo Region, which contracted with Comcare to provide nursing service. (CCAC's are required by the provincial government to contract out home care services, often to for-profit corporations.)

The CCAC was released from the lawsuit when a judge, on Christmas Eve, quietly approved a settlement reached through mediation last summer. Comcare Limited, through its insurer, was held responsible. For more, see here.

Earlier this year Comcare became part of Revera, which has 30,000 employees in Canada in the US and plays a major role in long term care.

dallan@cupe.ca

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