The Green Sleeve Initiative: A Sunshine Coast Innovation That Could Help Save Your Life
By Rik Jespersen for Coast Hospice
It was the last thing I wanted to do. There was no item on my to-do list that involved thinking about my having a medical emergency, or about my death, or the decisions that might have to be made for me in the process of dying. That’s all changed now – not due to any personal crisis, but thanks to a local organization’s efforts prompting us to consider these matters before it’s too late.
I have the good fortune to be relatively healthy for someone born in the middle of the last century. But that puts me in an age bracket that, statistically, sits in a proverbial “red zone” for potential serious illness, and mortality. And I too often see obituaries in the Coast Reporter honouring those who had died suddenly or “after a brief illness” – many of them younger than me.
If I collapsed into unconsciousness, how quickly could first responders and emergency room staff determine if I had a long-term health condition? Do I have an implanted heart pacemaker? Did I have a health condition that would make chest compressions dangerous? Was I prescribed medication that I might have taken too much of, or forgotten to take at all? Who among my loved ones should they notify? If I were cognitively incapacitated, who had I designated to make decisions about my care?
If only there were a practical way that we could provide readily accessible answers to these crucial questions in advance! Well, there is a way, and my opportunity to learn about it came in a workshop organized by the Sunshine Coast Hospice Society.
The key workshop focus is the Green Sleeve, a name made easier to remember thanks to the familiar 16th-century folk song, Greensleeves, and by the fact that the plastic sleeve is indeed a tasteful and easy-to-spot bright green. The kit contains the information needed by family and first responders in a medical emergency, and it even comes with attached magnetic strips that will stick it to a refrigerator.
The Green Sleeve is a clever and sensible innovation and, as workshop facilitators and Hospice volunteers Jackie Scott and Joan Hibbard explained during the two-hour session, it was developed right here on the Sunshine Coast.
When COVID began hitting B.C. communities hard in 2020, Scott and Hibbard were working with local palliative-care specialist Dr. Carmen Goojha to help inform people about some of the challenges of pandemic medical care.
“We thought, wasn't it a pity that there isn't a place or a way that we can store (medical) documents and communicate them if something happens to us,” Scott said. “So, out of that first conversation, we began working with a paramedic from BC Ambulance, with nurses from the shíshálh First Nation, and with the palliative-care team with Dr. Goojha, to develop the Sunshine Coast Green Sleeve.”
The workshop facilitators played a video in which Pender Harbour paramedic Yvonne Lewis related her first-hand experience. “I don't know how many homes I've been in where we're looking through bathroom cabinets for medications, we're looking through the kitchen for documentation, looking at your purses and wallets to try and find health cards and information.”
Today, if first responders were to come to my home, they’d see two small, green-dot stickers by the front door. That’s an indication that the occupants, my wife Heather and I, have Green Sleeves either attached to the refrigerator or placed obviously in a drawer or cupboard nearby.
What they’d find in our Green Sleeves are Emergency Information Forms containing pertinent information about our health history and conditions, any prescriptions we’re on, our doctor’s name and phone number, who our emergency contacts are and how to reach them. Being armed with this data makes first responders’ jobs much more straightforward and they can get patients into an ambulance and to the ER more confidently and quickly.
The Green Sleeve workshop, offered free around the Coast several times a year, also helps us delve into a whole other aspect of dealing with our future medical concerns: Advance Care Planning (ACP). While the emergency information in the kit can be completed in a short time and you can get it up on your fridge or in a drawer relatively quickly, the optional ACP content is a different matter.
There is information dealing with types of Representation Agreements, identifying who you’d want to delegate as a substitute decision-maker if you become too unwell to decide for yourself about your care. That will involve conversations with family members and other loved ones. If you’re already living with serious health issues, there’s a form called Medical Orders for Scope of Treatment, or MOST, which requires a detailed discussion with your doctor. These are deep waters and can be tricky to navigate. The workshop provides advice on how to proceed successfully.
You don’t have to have been born in the middle of the last century to get your free Green Sleeve. In fact, anyone over 50 would be smart to complete one. The information can be updated anytime. Close to 3,000 kits have been distributed to Coast residents so far.
You can learn more about the Green Sleeve program, workshop dates, or arranging for trained volunteers to help you get it ready at www.coasthospice.com/acp.
Coast Hospice will be in-store at London Drugs on Friday, July 26, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. to distribute the free kit and answer questions.
The next community information session will be held at the Sechelt Seniors Activity Centre on Friday, September 27, from 2 to 4 p.m.