Complex care in Vancouver usually starts with a discharge from Vancouver General Hospital or St. Paul's: an IV, a wound vac, a feeding tube, sometimes a trach. Salve's HCP-licensed clinical team covers Downtown and the West End, Kitsilano and Point Grey, Mount Pleasant and Main Street and the rest of the city, with most procedures performed by a Registered Nurse and personal-care continuing alongside.
§IV therapy at home: IV antibiotics, IV hydration, PICC line dressing changes and flushes (with physician order), central line maintenance, using the client's hospital-issued or prescribed pump
§Tube feeding and PEG / G-tube management: feeding, site care, basic clog troubleshooting in collaboration with family; complex issues like tube replacement coordinated with the clinic or hospital
§Tracheostomy care: suctioning, airway maintenance, routine trach care alongside the respiratory therapist. We don't manage ventilator settings; that stays with the RT.
§Palliative nursing: pain and symptom management, comfort, family support (distinct from formal hospice, which runs under a separate BC framework)
§Oxygen, BiPAP and CPAP support, suctioning, compression therapy, mechanical-lift transfers
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Who it's for
Families whose loved one is being discharged from hospital with a complex plan (wounds, tubes, infusions, equipment), or whose ongoing condition has grown beyond what personal care alone can hold. Often arranged in coordination with a hospital social worker and the family's medical team.
Hours and schedule
Frequency depends on the plan. Some clients need a daily skilled-nursing visit, some weekly, some on a flexible schedule that wraps around personal care. Caregiver-led shifts have a four-hour minimum; standalone RN visits (a short, specific clinical task: wound change, IV flush, injection) can be as short as one hour. Days, evenings, overnights, and around-the-clock multi-shift coverage all available.
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Hospital-grade tasks, home-grade setting.
Vancouver's complex-care clients usually leave VGH or St. Paul's with a plan several pages long: infusions on a schedule, a wound that needs trained eyes, a tube that frightens everyone but the nurse. Our RNs carry the clinical list (IV therapy, wound care, catheter and ostomy, tube feeding, injections) in coordination with the hospital team, while caregivers keep the ordinary day running. Equipment lives where the client lives; the hospital stops being the only safe place.
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Complex care in Vancouver: what families ask.
Who supervises the clinical work?
The plan stays with your loved one's physicians; our Registered Nurses deliver it under Salve's BC HCP license, with documentation after every clinical visit. Where something sits outside our scope (ventilator settings, for example), we say so plainly and it stays with the respiratory therapist.
Can personal care and nursing visits be combined?
Yes, that's the usual shape: caregiver shifts carry the daily routine and RN visits slot in for clinical tasks. One team, one set of notes, one number to call.
Where in Vancouver we deliver.
We see Vancouver families in Downtown and the West End, Kitsilano and Point Grey, Mount Pleasant and Main Street, Dunbar and Kerrisdale, Marpole and Oakridge, East Vancouver: Hastings, Commercial, Renfrew, and South Vancouver: Sunset, Killarney, Champlain Heights.
What it costs, and how families pay for it (extended health, VAC, CSIL,
and more), is laid out in costs and coverage. The people behind the visits are here: meet our caregivers.
BCCPA-member agencyBC HCP-licensed (Health Care Professionals & Services)WorkSafeBC registeredICBC-certified Personal Care Assistance providerFully insured & bonded caregiversBLS-certified, First Aid trained15+ years caring for BC families since 2011
