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KANGIQLINIQ/RANKIN INLET - A Nunavummiut couple who moved south for medical treatment are wondering why the GN help them with their living expenses.

Alma Sharp, 57, needs such frequent medical care that she moved to the Winnipeg area from Rankin Inlet nine months ago rather than endure medical flights several times a week. Although the Government of Nunavut would have paid for her flights, they haven't helped her with costs of living in Manitoba.

Keith and Alma Sharp in a hospital in Winnipeg. Alma has needed a wheelchair since late 2007. - photo courtesy of Pelagie Sharp

"We have probably saved them $150,000-$200,000 dollars in transportation costs by staying down here," said Alma's husband Keith Sharp from their home, a farm about 1.5 hours outside Winnipeg.

Since September 2008 Alma has had more than 40 medical examinations. In the same time period she has been hospitalized three times.

Keith, a retired outfitter, said travelling from Rankin Inlet for medical care simply isn't an option, considering how often she would have to fly. Medical travel is very difficult for Alma, who has needed a wheelchair since late 2007. Passengers must disembark when the plane refuels, which happens at least once per trip from Rankin Inlet to Winnipeg. Also, some of the planes do not have a bathroom on board, which is another problem for Alma, an Inuk beneficiary who suffers from mini-strokes. The trip takes two-to-three hours because of the multiple community stops involved.

"It's bloody well impossible for someone with disabilities," Keith said.

A representative of Nunavut's Department of Health and Social Services addressed the physical difficulties of medical travel.

"When someone has a physical disability arrangements are made to make their travel as comfortable as possible with assistance getting on and off the plane when necessary," explained Annamarie Hedley, manager of health insurance programs.

Rankin Inlet simply cannot provide the level of care Alma needs. She requires two or three sessions of physiotherapy per week, while in Rankin all that's available is one hour per month from a physiotherapist on a territorial circuit. It turns out physiotherapy isn't readily available in the Winnipeg area, either. The Sharps, who have bought a home in Ericsdale, a small town outside Winnipeg, are arranging private home care and physiotherapy because the waiting list for physiotherapy is six months long. Keith said he was told the Government of Nunavut would not help pay for that.

"(Alma) pretty well can't do anything for herself," Keith said. "She can't use a knife or fork properly. We have to cut her food."

They have been meeting their own medical and living expenses, which Keith estimated at more than $50,000 so far. They're spending close to $20,000 to make their home wheelchair accessible, he said.

Keith said they had been advised to get Manitoba health cards, something neither of them wants to do for personal reasons. Keith and Alma consider themselves Nunavummiut and want their official place of residence to be their home in Rankin Inlet, even though they are not there that often any more.

"We're Northerners and we've always been," he said.

Hedley said the department encourages people to get local health cards if they are going to be outside Nunavut for more than a year.

Also, if he gets a Manitoba health card, Keith is worried he might be financially responsible if he needs a medevac while visiting Rankin Inlet.

Alma has been facing a difficult medical situation since she started experiencing small strokes in 2006, which were only diagnosed correctly years later. Keith blames the couple's predicament on the lack of continuity of medical care in Rankin Inlet. Doctors constantly fly in and out and do not have the time to become familiar with every patient's long-term medical histories, he said.

Before the mini-strokes were diagnosed, a neurologist found Alma had elevated levels of mercury in her bloodstream, a toxic metal found in various levels in marine mammals because of industrial pollution. Keith said a doctor had told him mercury poisoning could account for some of her symptoms.

Keith and Alma have since quit eating seal and maktaaq.