A Winnipeg woman wants a meeting with Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister and Health Minister Kelvin Goertzen to discuss what she calls a lack of home care services.

Linda Blair said home care workers have failed to show up to help her 75-year-old mom, Dru Landers, eight times since Dec. 24.

The Winnipeg Regional Health Authority said missed appointments may be weather-related, but Blair doesn't buy their reason and said the missed appointments aren't only happening during heavy snowfalls.

Landers lives with chronic pain and anxiety and has limited mobility. She has been receiving home care for the past two and a half years.

Landers relies on home care workers to visit her apartment building four times a day to bring her meals, help her take medication and assist with personal hygiene. When home care workers are unavailable Blair has to leave work at a daycare to help her mom with those tasks.

"It's ridiculous what's going on," Blair said. "Over the Christmas break it's escalated, it's bad."

Blair said what's worse is no one called her to warn about the delays, or to consistently notify her when a home care worker is unavailable to help her mom.

"Over the break she wasn't getting her meals," Blair added. "This is bad, this is a crisis."

WRHA Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Réal Cloutier said staff are following up on Blair's concerns and apologized for the missed appointments.

Cloutier said it's not clear in Blair's mom's case if the missed appointments were directly related to the weather, a sick worker or staffing shortages.

Cloutier said the heavy snowfall on Dec. 26 and Dec. 27 prevented staff from getting to all home care clients. Priority was given to clients who required urgent care.

Home care is not a guaranteed service and families should have a backup plan to help a loved one if home care is unavailable, Cloutier said.

He said the WRHA is working on strategies to make the service more reliable.

Blair said she can't handle any more missed appointments. She worries about other patients who don't have the same family support system as her mom.

"I'm tired of their excuses," Blair said. "Half of these people don't have family members. Who's tending to them."

The WRHA said staff make 400,000 home care visits each month.

There are currently 14,000 home care clients in Winnipeg.