The Ontario Finnish Resthome Association (OFRA) is a multi-level seniors community. This includes Two Retirement Homes, an Assisted Living home and a Long-term Care home.  OFRA houses over 430 residents, and had plan to expand our 64 resident home to a 128 bed home in fall.

Within the last month, everyone here at OFRA are fighting hard to ensure the health and well-being of your loved ones. The staff are taking all possible measures to ensure the safety of residents and staff, going above and beyond government mandated activities, while switching their methods of interacting with residents.

 Our long-term care home (LTCH) is receiving extra funding during this outbreak, but it does not cover everything. We are most concerned about the extra costs for our Assisted Living complex as well as both of our independent living retirement homes.

We are fundraising $20,000 to help with the cost of Personal Protective Equipment and other resident needs and assistive items. These funds would assist with 1/3 of the cost currently spent, but we expect our expenses to continue to increase exponentially.

Presently, our biggest shortage in PPE is in gowns (either fabric or disposable) as well as surgical masks, much like everywhere else in the world.  Surgical masks which used to be $0.21 each can now cost up to $1, with delivery delays of up to a month. OFRA’s current mask usage is 100 per day. If an outbreak occurs, this number could quadruple in a matter of days, if not more!  Other additional COVID-19 costs include items such as disposable plates and utensils that are used for all of our residents in our LTCH and Assisted living units because their meals are being delivered to them in their apartments.  Finally, our greatest expense at the moment is wages.  We have increased staffing to ensure the safety of our residents. This includes 24 hour, 7 day a week door screeners to properly maintain our lockdown, increased Personal Support Workers to ensure multiple daily visits to maintain proper physical examinations and to reduce resident isolation, increased housekeeping to clean rooms twice a day and much more.

Funds donated today would greatly assist in our ever growing need for PPE and much needed items for both our residents and staff. Here at OFRA we provide the highest quality of care to our residents, but as a not-for-profit organization we do not have deep pockets.  These extra safeguards for our residents during these times are depleting our reserves.  As such, we would appreciate any type of assistance that you can.