The COVID-19 pandemic has made things more complicated for Canadians being fitted with prosthetic devices. Sarah Calvert is a high school principal who recently had a second leg amputated due to complications from Type 2 diabetes .
In February 2018, Calvert was fitted with her first prosthetic after the amputation of her lower left leg due to a blocked artery. In 2020, the lower right leg was removed because diabetes had caused her to not feel cuts or blisters in her foot that led to severe infections.
The West Park Healthcare Centre is one of the few institutions in Canada that provides amputees with full care from start to finish. (West Park Healthcare Centre)
Patients had to stay in hospital for rehab
To get therapy to get used to her new prosthetic, Calvert went to the West Park Healthcare Centre in Toronto in late September. The centre has a busy prosthetic lab which serves the largest number of patients in the province of Ontario. It is one of the few institutions in Canada that provides patients with full care from start to finish.
Because of the pandemic, all patients who receive new prosthetics have to stay at the hospital until all their care is complete. They could not go home on weekends.
While Calvert was in hospital she was able to combine her rehabilitation with her virtual work as principal of a high school serving about 1,000 students and 52 teachers. She was finally discharged at the end of October.
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