'This is disgusting': Mice spotted again at Edmonton psychiatric hospital

A patient at Edmonton's psychiatric hospital has raised concerns about a persistent pest issue at the facility.

Marina Gouveia, who was at Alberta Hospital Edmonton earlier this summer, first noticed a mouse in her room and subsequently began seeing the rodents every few days.

"This is disgusting," Gouveia said. "I had no idea this was an issue."

She recounted that after seeing the mouse for the first time, she informed the staff, who placed a trap. “It was the nursing staff who put it in there,” she said. “They caught it, because then I could hear it in the trap. It sat in the hallway for at least a week.”

Despite the initial intervention, the problem continued. Gouveia eventually recorded a video of a mouse searching through her clothes.

“My perception is if this were happening at the U of A hospital or the Royal Alex, things would get done,” she said. “I understand the age of the Alberta Hospital building and all of that, but no one seems to care.”

Gouveia was admitted under the Mental Health Act in June due to mental health episodes she attributes to her poor living conditions. Initially taken to Misericordia Hospital by RCMP, she was later transferred to Alberta Hospital, located in the city’s northeast.

Since June, she has been in Building 10, which accommodates acute psychiatric patients. Alberta Hospital, established in the 1920s to treat veterans with what was then called shell shock, includes some older, deteriorating buildings, many of which are now boarded up.

In 2015, former Edmonton Journal columnist Paula Simons described Alberta Hospital as "a place that time, and successive health ministers, seem to have forgotten."

Pest issues have been a recurring problem at the hospital, worsening in the fall when pests seek warmth indoors. Gouveia said the pests have significantly disrupted her sleep.

“I can’t sleep. I finally had to ask for sleeping pills,” she said. “It’s not that easy to sleep in hospitals to begin with. When you’re sitting there wondering, ‘What is that noise? Is it a mouse? Are they chewing something? Are they climbing on my clothes again?’ I’m like, ‘How is that possible?'”

Since raising the issue with the local MLA, Gouveia noted that pest control efforts have intensified. She expects to be discharged this week.

Alberta Health Services spokesperson James Wood stated that the health authority is “concerned” about the mouse problem in Building 10 and is “actively working to address the risk to patients and staff.”

“Our first priority is the health and safety of our patients and providing them with a clean and safe environment to access health care,” Wood said.

Repair work and deep cleaning are underway where pests have been reported, and a pest control company is now on site five days a week instead of three. “They will remain on site until the issue is resolved,” Wood added.

Patients and staff are encouraged to continue reporting pest sightings, he said.

Jacqueline Petrie, an Edmonton lawyer specializing in mental health law, expressed concern that Alberta Hospital is not treated as other public facilities would be in similar situations.

“You can bet if this were a problem in any other Alberta hospital serving the public, there would be such an outcry that it would be fixed immediately,” she said.

She highlighted that these conditions persist even though the provincial government is running a $4 billion surplus.

“A combination of stigma towards the mentally ill and insufficient health care funding leads to deplorable hospital conditions and hinders recovery and rehabilitation, which ironically is supposed to be the goal of treatment,” Petrie noted.