The colon cancer screening program in Nova Scotia is now available to some of those without a home address, but gaps remain.

Patients who request a test can now have one sent to Mobile Outreach Street Health in Halifax. They can then complete the test and the organization will send it back.

The colon cancer prevention program is a mail-out program designed to screen Nova Scotians for early-stage colon cancer. It has been inaccessible to individuals experiencing homelessness.

Tests are sent out automatically to those with health cards once they turn 50, and continue every two years until they turn 75.

Barriers to access

Trish McKay, a nurse and the patient care co-ordinator at Mobile Outreach Street Health, said there was no way in the past to administer the tests in a walk-in clinic setting either.

She said that while those presenting symptoms of colon cancer will receive emergency care, the preventive testing the program was designed for has been impossible to provide to people without a fixed address for a couple of different reasons.

“Someone would come in to see a walk-in physician having no symptoms, and that won’t trigger any sort of testing,” she said.

Clinics haven’t been given stocks of the tests, either.

McKay said she asked Nova Scotia Health if Mobile Outreach Street Health could receive a supply of the testing kits to have on hand, but was told that wouldn’t be possible.

“They want to be able to keep tabs on the kits that are going out, where they’re going and when they come back,” she said. “And it’s more so to keep track of the results and make sure that they’re acting on the results appropriately and within an appropriate time frame.”

Nova Scotia Health was contacted but did not provide a statement before this article was published.

McKay said Mobile Outreach Street Health came up with the solution in February.

No workaround yet for other parts of the province

Sharon MacKenzie, a nurse at the Ally Centre in Sydney, said the workaround is a promising sign, but until it’s extended to other parts of the province only people in Halifax will see the benefits.

“We would like to be able to have a few kits on hand to provide,” she said. “That way you can kind of meet people where they are in the moment.”

MacKenzie said the lack of access to the program is a symptom of a broader lack of health-care access that unhoused people face.

“I think a lot of these screening programs and such are great,” she said. “But when people don’t have access to a medical practitioner, I think that poses a major barrier across whatever program you’re trying.”

MacKenzie said she thinks Nova Scotia Health should work to expand access to the program.

Lack of access feels like a setback

Jessica Jarl lives in a shelter in Halifax. She said she’s in the process of getting her life back on track after multiple surgeries and addiction left her living on the street.

But she said that after being diagnosed with a chronic illness, she thinks a lack of access to health care is making things more difficult than they should be.

“I got this health concern that just feels like it really, really set me back,” she said.

She said she’s been refused care due to her appearance and the fact that she lives in the shelter when visiting the emergency room.

“I feel like I’m profiled too at this point,” she said. “I do have a couple tattoos on my face, and that shouldn’t mean anything.”

Jarl said that between the health issues that come with being unhoused and the accessibility barriers she faces, she feels that she’s falling through gaps in the system.

“I feel that they just really don’t want to help us,” she said.

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