Photo: The Canadian Press

Jennifer Brady, who suffers from lymphedema – a disease that causes a build-up of fluid that can lead to painful swelling, increased risk of blood infection, cellulite and hardening of the skin – undergoes more than five hours of treatment daily in a device called the Lympha Press at her home in Halifax, September 19. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darren Calabrese

Nova Scotia’s premier is apologizing after a court slammed his government for what he calls a flawed, discriminatory and unfair process that led to two women being turned down for out-of-province treatment coverage.

In a decision issued Friday, Nova Scotia Supreme Court Justice Timothy Gabriel overturned the province’s “unreasonable” refusals to reimburse Jennifer Brady, who has painful lymphedema in her legs, and Crystal Ellingsen, who suffers from leg lipedema and arms, for their treatments. .

Brady’s condition causes tissue to swell from the buildup of fluids normally drained through the body’s lymphatic system, and Ellingsen asked the province to fund surgery to remove the diseased tissue, increase his mobility and relieve chronic pain.

In his decision, Gabriel said the province’s review of their cases was not transparent and was riddled with errors, and the rejection was unreasonable because “in reality, there was no one in Canada who could treat any of their conditions their”.

The judge ordered the parties to submit potential solutions to him, now that he has overturned the initial refusals.

“We have concluded that the effect of the regulations … during applicants’ struggles with MSI (the province’s health insurance program) discriminated against applicants based on their rare medical conditions,” he wrote. “We found that the claimants were treated in a procedurally unfair manner.”

He criticized the department’s process of referring women to specialists who had years-long waiting lists and would not be able to provide an out-of-province referral for treatment.

In Ellingsen’s case, an MSI representative advised her that she needed a lipedema specialist to refer her to obtain reimbursement for surgery in Germany. Since there was no such specialist in Nova Scotia, she was referred to a plastic surgeon. His office told her they weren’t taking patients with her condition and had a four-year waiting list.

Brady faced similar barriers and sought surgery outside the country in Japan in 2022. She said the treatment was effective, but cost her more than $60,000 and requires additional surgeries.

The judge said the waiting times and reasons for refusals were “unsustainable”, noting that the plastic surgeon had informed the Department of Health that he could not help with referrals.

“Through it all, the applicants have tried to function through a miasma of debilitating and chronic pain. The situation they found themselves in could very well be described as Kafkaesque,” Gabriel wrote.

Progressive Conservative Premier Tim Houston, who is seeking re-election on Nov. 26, said in a statement that he agrees the women were mistreated, adding that the province will reimburse both women for their medical and legal expenses so far and fund them in continuation. treatment that is needed to manage Brady’s ongoing condition.

“On behalf of the province of Nova Scotia, I offer my unconditional and sincere apologies to Ms. Brady and Ms. Ellingsen,” Houston said. “They shouldn’t have been treated the way they were.”

He said he has also written to the auditor general, asking her to do “a thorough review of how the Department of Health handles these types of requests” and that she is ordering a review of the province’s system for approving outside treatments the province. .

On Sunday, Brady confronted Houston at her campaign launch, pressing him to explain what he was doing to help people in her situation.

The party leader has made health improvements the centerpiece of his government’s agenda – and faces criticism from the opposition that despite hundreds of millions in extra spending over the past four years, the system remains dysfunctional.

Brady said it was hard to celebrate the victory in the yard because he still had to see the Prime Minister’s commitments fulfilled. “There’s still a long way to go and there are still question marks about what this will actually mean,” she said in an interview Friday.

She said she would have to see the promised funding to believe it. “My concern (is) that these are political promises because he (Houston) is running an election campaign based on fixing health care and listening to the people of Nova Scotia, neither of which he did for me,” she said.