Judge rejects auditor general's bid to access Vitalité's internal audits on travel nurses
A New Brunswick judge has rejected the auditor general's bid to access Vitalité Health Network's internal audits of its controversial travel-nurse contracts.
Auditor General Paul Martin sought a court order to compel the regional health authority to disclose the documents as part of his investigation into the management and use of private agency nurses by Vitalité, Horizon and the Department of Social Development between Jan. 1, 2022, and Feb. 29, 2024.
But Court of King's Bench Chief Justice Tracey DeWare dismissed his application, saying she's not satisfied the Auditor General Act provides an explicit waiver of Vitalité's claims of litigation privilege or solicitor-client privilege.
These privileges are "foundational to our legal system," DeWare wrote in her decision, dated June 2.
"The Court can only endorse a legislative interpretation which abrogates these privileges in circumstances where the intention of the Legislature can be clearly discerned to have contemplated the scope of such an exceptional authority."
Vitalité is entitled to costs of $2,000, she ruled.
CBC News requested an interview with Martin, including whether he intends to appeal. In response, his office sent an emailed statement, saying he received notice of the dismissal last week and is "currently assessing the next steps."
Vitalité did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a scathing report last June, Martin concluded Vitalité spent $123 million in travel-nurse contracts dating back to 2022, when the regional health authority signed its first deal with Canadian Health Labs. The Ontario-based agency charged about $300 an hour per nurse — roughly six times what a local staff nurse earns.
"The contracts with private nursing agencies were not reflective of best practices and did not demonstrate value for money," Martin said at the time.
As part of that audit, launched in March 2024, Martin requested "various information and documents" from Vitalité, including internal audit reports on the use of agency nurses.
Internal audits were to probe 'irregularities'
Vitalité refused to provide the internal audit reports. It had commissioned the audits after it "noticed irregularities in some of the services rendered by the agency nurses which were not in conformity with the terms set out in the governing contracts," according to DeWare's decision.
No details are provided, but "in order to investigate potential deficiencies in the services rendered by the nursing agencies, [Vitalité] commissioned an internal audit of the performance of one of the contracts spanning the period between August 2022 and June 2023."
Vitalité alleges these audits "confirmed the existence of deficiencies in the performance of the agency nurses' contract with one of the agencies — Canadian Health Labs," DeWare wrote.
The company has since launched three lawsuits against Vitalité for allegedly breaching three of its contracts — two expired and one still in force. It's seeking compensation, including punitive, aggravated and special damages.
Vitalité has filed statements of defence, as well as counterclaims in all three cases.
Martin argued act covers privileged information
Martin applied to the court for an injunction on Oct. 9. "Under the Auditor General Act, I have rights of access to any information relating to the performance of my duties," he wrote in a sworn affidavit. This includes privileged information, he argued.
Section 13 (a) of the act says the auditor general is entitled to "free access at all convenient times to information, including files, documents, records, agreements and contracts, despite that they may be confidential or private, that relates to the fulfilment of his or her responsibilities."
According to Martin, changes the legislature made to that section in 2014, including the auditor general's ability to obtain "private and confidential" information, were specifically made to address this type of situation, DeWare wrote. Discussions surrounding the amendments demonstrate there was a clear desire to enhance the auditor general's authority to obtain necessary information, Martin argued.
Vitalité says disclosure would prejudice litigation
Vitalité countered that disclosure of the internal audit reports "would prejudice its ability to prosecute" the action against Canadian Health Labs, according to Deware, and that Section 13 (a) of the act "does not explicitly displace or supersede otherwise valid claims of litigation or solicitor-client privilege."
If the New Brunswick Legislature had intended for the section to override litigation or solicitor-client privilege, it would have explicitly stated so in the statute, as it does in the Ombudsman Act, Vitalité argued.
DeWare noted the Ontario Court of Appeal recently upheld a trial court decision that the Auditor General Act of that province, which, similar to New Brunswick's, does not contain a specific waiver of a valid privilege, "did not authorize access nor compel disclosure of privileged information."
The Supreme Court of Canada also considered a similar issue when interpreting a section of Alberta's Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act in 2016, said DeWare. The country's highest court ruled legislative language must be interpreted restrictively when determining if solicitor-client privilege may be set aside.
Act not explicit, judge rules
"While I appreciate the [auditor general's] argument, the addition of the words 'confidential and private' to section 13 indicates an expanded scope to the information which could be sought, it falls short of explicitly stating an intention to have access to 'privileged' documents," DeWare said.
She pointed out that with the 2014 amendments, the legislature didn't adopt the "explicit" language of Nova Scotia's Auditor General Act — "solicitor-client privilege, litigation privilege, settlement privilege and public interest immunity."
"The language of the Nova Scotia statute could not be any clearer."
Section 13 (a) of the New Brunswick act "does not grant the Auditor General the authority to require production of documents or information which are properly subject to a solicitor-client or litigation privilege," DeWare ruled.
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That inspired hope and a hunt for a solution. 'There's got to be something out there that the FDA or medical science hasn't approved,' he said. 'When it's the alternative of just sitting around waiting to die, you are willing to try just about anything.' Geoff, a CEO of several companies in his mid-60s, was an active golfer and wakeboarder before his diagnosis. He devolved rapidly, from limping to a cane to a walker to a wheelchair. He lost his ability to type, feed himself or go to the bathroom without help. One day last summer, Teresa came across a YouTube video featuring Dayan Goodenowe. Geoff instantly recognized something different in his tone and his claims. In one video, Goodenowe says, "ALS is a serious disease, but it can be beaten.' In another, he says, 'Stopping the progression of ALS actually isn't that hard. It really is just biochemical math.' Goodenowe is not a medical doctor, but he does have a PhD in medical science with a focus on psychiatry. 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Michael Gieselman and his wife Shannon, also from Southern California, were checking out Goodenowe's program last summer as well. Michael, a 57-year-old sales director and former U.S. Navy pilot, was diagnosed with ALS in April 2022. His condition was quickly deteriorating. He had difficulty breathing, swallowing and speaking, and was unable to walk. Goodenowe offered hope. 'Even if you take a look at some individuals that were in worse case than you with loss of full hand movements, we get their muscle function back, we get their lung function back,' he told them in a video call. 'You are not going to die of ALS in our care,' Goodenowe told Michael. 'That's just the God's honest truth.' Zimmerman told them that the fix for ALS is actually well known in the scientific community. 'It's sad, but the scientists have actually known how to reverse ALS for decades,' she said. 'I'm not putting down pharma in any way, but … the same companies that profit off of you being sick are not going to be the companies that are going to bring you a cure, and anyone who believes that is deluding themselves.' 'There's been no progression whatsoever' The most persuasive part of the pitch for Michael was the testimonial offered by Corey Mitchell in a video on Goodenowe's website. It features the bearded 49-year-old telling his story of ALS recovery and saying the disease had completely stopped progressing. 'I'm starting to feel like time is on my side,' he says in the video, with a scratchy voice. Michael was sold, but Shannon was skeptical. She asked to speak with Mitchell and his partner Jennifer about the treatment, but after the phone call, she remained unpersuaded. 'I didn't believe any of it,' she told CBC. She said she was frustrated by Michael's gullibility. 'I could barely restrain myself. How can my husband believe?' she asked herself. 'My husband is the most skeptical person on the planet. But this is what's so sad about the whole thing. That's how desperate these poor people with this disease are.' Michael signed up for Goodenowe's home delivery program: four months of supplements shipped to his house, supported by staff who conducted regular testing and provided advice. On the call, Shannon and Michael explained that they weren't certain he would survive until the end of the four-month program. They asked if the price could be pro-rated on a month-by-month basis. Goodenowe said no. 'The reality is we have more people than we can take care of right now,' he told them. 'I'm sorry.… It's not what we do.' So they paid the full amount up front — $90,000 US. A trip to Moose Jaw Goodenowe offered Geoff Sando a different solution: three months living in Goodenowe's Restorative Health Centre in Moose Jaw, about 60 kilometres west of Regina, followed by a final month back in Geoff's home in Southern California. Goodenowe has converted a two-storey former drug rehab centre on the edge of town into a wellness centre for people with neurodegenerative diseases. 'It's not a fancy place. Like we call this place boot camp,' Goodenowe said as he toured CBC around the facility. 'You're not here for us to pamper you. We're here to get you out of here. Like this is rehab.' His clients, mostly ALS patients, live in dorm-like rooms and eat cafeteria-style food. Goodenowe says the program offers occasional lectures, testing services, physiotherapy and opportunities to interact with other clients. Geoff said the centre was billed as 'a place for healing' where you could 'just rest, relax, and recover.' This facility is just the beginning of Goodenowe's plans for his hometown. In April, he announced the Moose Jaw Vitality Project, which his website describes as 'a $100 million community health initiative providing free access to cutting-edge health services and monitoring technologies for all residents of Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.' Goodenowe says this program will transform Moose Jaw into 'Canada's next 'Blue Zone' — a place where living past 100 is the norm, not the exception.' The project is planned to involve five facilities including the restorative health center, a cafe and a facility that will manufacture Goodenowe's patented plasmalogen supplements, which he has manufactured in the United States until now. 'The time has come though to incorporate these advanced technologies into routine care and into public health,' he said in a video on his website. 'Our goal is to use Moose Jaw as a beacon to the rest of the world to say 'Here's what a community who engages with each other, can actually achieve.'' Plasmalogen supplements are at the core of Goodenowe's ALS program. He says they are 'special fats' that are crucial for building cell membranes in the body — 'essential molecules for brain and heart health.' Goodenowe says people with neurological diseases like Alzheimer's, autism and ALS have a plasmalogen deficit that he can fix. 'It's basically human biochemical engineering,' he said on Dr. Amy Novotny's Reawaken Your Health Podcast late last year. 'If you actually provide the cells of the human body with the ingredients that they need and then put yourself in an environment that stimulates that adaptability, the body will fix itself.' The total cost of the four-month live-in program is $75,000 US. Geoff and Teresa were sold. 'I was really going to work hard to be the most improved,' he said. Questions emerge The couple arrived in Moose Jaw in early September 2024. It didn't take long for questions to emerge. To them, the facility didn't seem set up for people with serious degenerative diseases and mobility issues. For example, the only way to get to the second floor (where the kitchen is) is a staircase, making it inaccessible for many residents like Geoff. Goodenowe acknowledged that issue. 'We always laugh about the stairs,' Goodenowe said. 'People say, 'Dayan, when are you going to put an elevator in your facility?'' He said you can look at the stairs as part of the program. 'They'll come in not being able to walk or basically [not] being able to get out of a wheelchair. And the goal is, within three months, is to get them walking up stairs,' Goodenowe said. Teresa said that once, during an assessment, the staff left Geoff standing for too long and he fell. 'He didn't go backward or forward. He just crumpled,' she said. 'And neither of [the staff] caught him. And his legs were completely underneath him and he was screaming in pain. And they couldn't get him up.' 'That's when I became a little skeptical that, OK, they might not have the right personnel here to deal with ALS patients,' Geoff said. He said he was surprised to learn that there were no doctors or nurses on staff. Goodenowe told CBC he shouldn't have been surprised because 'we are not a medical facility. We do not provide medical care." Despite Geoff's concerns, he reminded himself that his primary reason for being there was the supplements. He still had great hope that they would work as promised. 'Self-directed research' Goodenowe provided Geoff and the other clients with a detailed day-by-day list of supplements to take at 8 a.m., noon, 4 p.m. and bedtime. The protocol includes many familiar products like creatine powder, collagen, magnesium and zinc. It also included regular doses of Goodenowe's patented plasmalogen-based products like NeuroPC+ and GliaPC+. At the bottom of the sheet, there was a footnote. 'This is a self-directed program. This protocol may be modified to suit your lifestyle and/or preferences.' In an interview with CBC, Goodenowe reiterated that point. 'We're here as a self-directed research process. People come in of their own voluntary will and they develop programs for themselves,' Goodenowe said. CBC asked Geoff about this 'self-directed research' idea. He said this was the first it had been brought to his attention and he never would have gone to Moose Jaw if he had known that was the deal. 'That's exactly the opposite of why I went to him. I went to him because he's the, supposedly, neuroscientist. I don't know anything about what to include. How am I going to self-direct?' he asked. 'You tell me this is what I need to get better, I'm going to take it.' Geoff said at no point did he develop his own program. 'The only thing I can figure out as a business person is that he's trying to limit his liability and try to claim, 'Well this is self-directed. It's not really designed by me. It's designed by the patient,'" said Geoff Timothy Caufield, the U of A law professor who specializes in legal and ethical issues in medical research, agrees. ' He wants to avoid the claim that he's providing medicine, right? That he's acting as a physician,' Caufield said. 'And his defence will be … 'I'm just providing these people with information and they're doing it themselves.'' For decades, Caufield has studied and written about what he regards as dubious medical claims. He's written academic and mainstream books like Is Gwyneth Paltrow wrong about everything? and The Cure For Everything: Untangling the Twisted Messages about Health, Fitness and Happiness. He reviewed Goodenowe's website and said he's seeing familiar patterns. 'We've studied this space for decades, and this is the go-to strategy. Heavily, heavily imply that you can cure the condition without explicitly saying you can cure the condition,' Caufield said. Caufield said if Goodenowe could really do what he's claiming, 'he should be publishing this in leading biomedical journals, having his claims and his data peer-reviewed by experts in the field, because it would be absolutely extraordinary.' He said the fact that hasn't happened is telling. 'If this individual really could do this, I promise you we would hear about it, right? This secret treatment would not be secret,' Caufield said. 'And there's no evidence that I'm aware of that would support those claims.' What's the evidence? Earlier this year, CBC asked Dayan Goodenowe for an interview about the evidence that backs up his extraordinary contention that his plasmalogen-based program can halt the progression of ALS symptoms and set patients on the path to recovery. CBC asked if he could point to any published scientific studies that back up his claim. 'Not published at this point in time,' he said. CBC asked why those studies hadn't been done. 'We're actually starting them right now,' he said. 'I'm just in negotiations with them.' Then he added that these sorts of studies are, 'not necessary for our clientele and our doctor network. This is a nutritional supplement. It's food, basically, OK? It's restoring food.' When pressed for evidence of his claims, Goodenowe points to people that seem to improve while taking his supplements. While touring the Moose Jaw facility, CBC spoke with 65-year-old Scott Myers, who had arrived from Akron, Ohio, just a few weeks earlier. 'Within the first week, I don't know if it was psychosomatic, but I had recovered the last movements that I had lost a couple weeks prior to that,' Myers said. Goodenowe also points to Corey Mitchell. In the video posted on Goodenowe's website, the 49-year-old former race car driver says, 'The disease has completely stopped. There's been no progression at all.' Goodenowe said the conclusion is clear. 'The actual progression of the disease can be stopped, OK, fundamentally unambiguously, his progression stopped,' Goodenowe said. 'It only takes one person to get better to falsify the hypothesis that this is a disease that cannot be reversed.' David Taylor, the chief scientific officer at the ALS Society of Canada, said this sort of claim is not convincing. He points out that ALS does not take a linear path. He said it's well known that patients can hit plateaus where the disease can appear to stop progressing or even improve. He adds that sometimes improvement can be attributed to placebo effects. 'It is well known that in any form of medicine, people who spend a lot of money, who go through a regimen that is more invasive, who have any kind of promises associated with a particular therapy, that those individuals do better with their disease,' Taylor said. He said he has seen no scientific evidence that plasmalogens can do what Goodenowe has claimed. 'If it were something that had a good, viable piece of information around it, we would all be looking at it. The world would go there because there'd be a lot of incentive to want to learn more about it, publish on it, make people's careers on it, and make money off of it as a pharmaceutical company,' Taylor said. 'You have an individual person's hypothesis versus an entire field of people who are spending every moment of every day trying to find that thing that's going to fix the disease.' 'You're saying Corey is a lie' Corey Mitchell's partner Jennifer Hoff said she did see improvement in his condition after he began Goodenowe's treatment program in Moose Jaw in the fall of 2023. She said his speech and ability to walk seemed to improve. She said it's possible that Goodenowe's plasmalogens helped, but also pointed out that Mitchell's stress levels dropped and his diet significantly improved while at the Moose Jaw facility. 'We changed his diet completely,' she said. 'Of course changing your diet and getting your inflammation down in your body, your body's going to respond.' Mitchell left Moose Jaw in early 2024 and his condition remained stable. Hoff said Goodenowe was clear regarding his view of Mitchell's improvement. 'He literally told him, 'You've beat ALS. You're in recovery phase. Now we just have to work on building your muscles,'' she said. In the summer of 2024, months after Mitchell shot his testimonial video, he and Hoff agreed to help Goodenowe promote the program by speaking with potential clients about the changes Mitchell had experienced. Goodenowe agreed to pay a stipend of $2,000 a month. 'We were getting bombarded with phone numbers of all these people. Hey, can you talk to so-and-so about Moose Jaw?' Hoff said. Then Mitchell's condition began to deteriorate once again. Hoff said he was no longer able to speak and so couldn't promote Goodenowe's program. Hoff reached out to Goodenowe for help. 'Not even a phone call back. And that's when I started to be like, something's not right here,' she said. Mitchell died on Oct. 21, 2024. 'What he died from wasn't from ALS progression,' Goodenowe told CBC. 'His disease did not progress to his death. He died from other causes.' When asked how he knew that, Goodenowe said, 'because he was functionally better last time I saw him. He was walking around.' Goodenowe last saw Mitchell in the summer of 2024. Hoff said Goodenowe's contention that Mitchell didn't die from ALS-related complications is 'a flat-out lie. I was there when he died. I held his hand. I watched him die.' According to Goodenowe, Mitchell's testimonial video remains on his website 'because he's still a symbol of hope, because he defied the odds.' 'His caregiver [Jennifer] said he declined and died of ALS. All of Corey's improvements, all of the work that he put through to make himself better was all bullshit, that's what you're saying to me right now,' Goodenowe said. 'You're saying Corey is a lie.' 'Sold a bill of goods' Corey Mitchell's story was instrumental in persuading Michael Giesleman to sign up for Goodenowe's ALS program. Michael died on Dec. 19, 2024, about four months after he began the program. 'He was just being sold a bill of goods and I just had to let him,' his wife Shannon said. 'That's how he chose to spend his last days.' She said she watched Michael become a different person after learning of his diagnosis. She said the desperation to find a cure consumed him. 'It took away his whole spirit. It took away everything,' she said. 'ALS is a no-win situation. The best thing you can do is just accept it and be happy right now and just live your life right now.' Geoff Sando is now back in California. His condition has deteriorated. 'Really didn't experience any halting of the progression while I was there or anytime since,' Geoff said. 'Actually it seemed like it was picking up pace, not slowing down." He added that he became friends with several through the program and they have stayed in touch. 'And it wasn't just me," he said. 'Everybody had declined pretty significantly.' Becky Bader is one of them. She was diagnosed with ALS in April 2024 and began attending Goodenowe's Moose Jaw program in early September — one day before Geoff and Teresa arrived. According to her husband Eric, she was losing about a point a month on the 48-point ALS functional rating scale, a questionnaire that helps to keep track of a patient's decline in speech, movement and breathing. Then she began Goodenowe's program. 'She lost two points the first month, two points the second month, three points the third month,' said Eric, who attended the program with her. 'So her functionality decrease accelerated.' Eric said he knows the disease is not linear, so he doesn't attribute her worsening condition to Goodenowe's treatment. However, 'we definitely did not see any improvement… Absolutely not.' Becky died last month — May 18, 2025. When CBC pointed out to Goodenowe that some of his clients said they had declined while on his program, he expressed doubt. 'So how documented is that decline? Do they have evidence of their decline or is it just their opinion?' he asked. 'We do document every single person that comes through our centre, OK? They leave that centre better than they came in, OK? And that's just simply a fact, OK?' Health Canada steps in Geoff and Teresa wonder how a facility like this is allowed to operate in Canada. They have filed complaints with Saskatchewan's College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Moose Jaw Police Service. They don't know where else to turn. Timothy Caufield said this story highlights a real problem. Goodenowe is not a medical doctor, so he's not under the jurisdiction of the College of Physicians and Surgeons. 'We need as a society to be able to transparently and appropriately stop individuals like this from doing what I think is clear and real harm,' Caufield said. 'The fact that we can't easily do it is really problematic.' Some action has been taken. In January, Health Canada began investigating Goodenowe's company. 'Following an onsite inspection on March 20, 2025, Health Canada found the company was importing, advertising, and selling unauthorized natural health products,' Health Canada said in a statement. All natural health products must be assessed by the government for safety before they can be legally sold in Canada. Health Canada says that since the inspection, 'the company confirmed they had stopped importing and selling unauthorized NHPs. They also committed to not promoting unauthorized health products and corrected their website.' Goodenowe said Health Canada's concerns were based on a misunderstanding. He said individual clients are able to import up to a 90-day supply of the plasmalogen supplements for personal use. He said some of those supplements had, instead, been shipped to his Moose Jaw company. 'What that meant was, we had accepted shipment on behalf of a client that wasn't directly labelled,' Goodenowe said. 'The Health Canada inspector said, 'Hey, you need to make sure that these things are properly labelled for the client that's receiving them,' and we said, 'Thank you, we'll fix that.'" Hopes dashed Geoff Sando is now spending as much time as he can with his family. His adult children live in his house and help with his care. When he started this process, he had visions of coming home to a hero's welcome. 'I thought I was going to come home and walk up those stairs from my garage in here,' he said. He justified the expense and the time away from family as an investment. 'Instead of two years with my kids, I would have 15, 20 years with my kids,' he said. 'Get to see my grandchildren. Be able to walk my daughter down the aisle. I don't know if I'll get to do any…' He trailed off, overtaken by emotion. Geoff said maybe Goodenowe has the nugget of a promising idea, but 'he hasn't developed something that stops progression in ALS… he's at best trying to figure it out.' 'We are part of an experiment. And that's not what I signed up to be and paid him a lot of money for — to be part of a trial.' About the Author Footer Links My Account Profile CBC Gem Newsletters Connect with CBC Facebook Twitter YouTube Instagram Mobile RSS Podcasts Contact CBC Submit Feedback Help Centre Audience Relations, CBC P.O. 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