1 email a week?

ljonski

Mum is in residential accommodation 120 miles away.
She is almost blind and exceedingly deaf.(over 90 yrs old)
I have no contact with my 2 siblings who live nearer and have their own transport, which i haven't.

Recently mum has been admitted into hospital twice for a night. First before Christmas despite having my contact details as next of kin, i never found out for over a week and that was by accident. 2nd time was told by email that she had been admitted more than 24 hours after the event but only picked it up a further 24 hours later. They never contacted me to tell me that she had been discharged back to them.

Would it be reasonable to ask them to email me weekly as to her general condition as it is virtually impossible to get her to hear me when i phone up.

Thanks

Alikay

Can't you phone them once a week and ask how she is? I agree that it's a bit off just emailing you when she went into hospital, but it's hardly their fault that you didn't pick it up for a further 24 hours. I guess you could ask for email updates, but care homes tend to be busy places with lots of part time and agency staff, so I think it would be difficult to assign one person the responsibility of keeping you updated when their priority is the personal care of the residents.

JoW123

ljonski wrote: »

Mum is in residential accommodation 120 miles away.
She is almost blind and exceedingly deaf.(over 90 yrs old)
I have no contact with my 2 siblings who live nearer and have their own transport, which i haven't.

Recently mum has been admitted into hospital twice for a night. First before Christmas despite having my contact details as next of kin, i never found out for over a week and that was by accident. 2nd time was told by email that she had been admitted more than 24 hours after the event but only picked it up a further 24 hours later. They never contacted me to tell me that she had been discharged back to them.

Would it be reasonable to ask them to email me weekly as to her general condition as it is virtually impossible to get her to hear me when i phone up.

Thanks

When you say they have your details as next-of-kin, do you mean you are the first contact to be informed? Sometimes the legal next of kin is different to the first contact, and they will only have a duty of care to inform one person of her hospital admission/discharge.


I agree with alikay, why don't you phone them once a week for your update?

piglet25

I am surprised that they emailed you rather than phoned you when she went into hospital, I would be ringing once a week as they may be less than keen to put details of your mum's health etc into an email, and to be fair its not their responsibility to keep you updated under normal circumstances, only when there is an incident that you need to be aware of.

Mojisola

ljonski wrote: »

Would it be reasonable to ask them to email me weekly as to her general condition as it is virtually impossible to get her to hear me when i phone up.

Alikay wrote: »

Can't you phone them once a week and ask how she is?

As Alikay says - the onus is on you to make the contact. If you speak every week to the staff, you can build up a relationship with them and are far more likely to be told when things happen.

Seanymph

it is more than possible that one of your siblings was contacted.

If they are nearer, and in regular contact, perhaps you could explain to them that you are interested in regular updates, and get the information from whoever the home are in contact with?

They won't want to contact three siblings individually every time something happens.

And perhaps your siblings think you are not interested - so don't pass along the day to day concerns and events?

ljonski

I guess phoning them once a week is probably the best thing to do.
I am not thoroughly happy with the care that she receives there and this is another aspect that worries me.
My mum however is happy there and it is a nice place but she is not aware of the failings that i have seen there, on my visits.
I don't wish to rock the boat but i want to make sure mum is treated as a lucid human being there(which she is) although her deafness and blindness act as barriers to communication with her- even at face to face level.

I am down as next of kin but not as the first port of call if anything should happen. I am trying to discuss with them the family problems that mean that i need them to contact me directly should anything dramatic happen.

There is a church visitor that does go and tells me about her about every 2 months, but even she has complained to me that the home has not contacted her whenever something like this has happened.

Also my cousin told me that when she visits she rings ahead to tell them to tell my mum that she is coming. They didn't tell her and the same thing happened to me last year.

It is simply not good enough for them to tell her (if they do) that she is having a visitor without ensuring that she repeats to them what has just been said to her.

As i say, she is completly lucid, although her last illness through lack of sodium in her system apparently makes her a bit confused!
Thanks

PasturesNew

I get an email if my sibling is informed mum's had a fall etc - as they're minor falls I generally get phoned the next day just to say "sent you an email" and then we discuss it. Generally mum's found/fallen - and they pick her up, sort her out, get the district nurse in, then, once they know that there's "no harm done" they'll phone my sibling.

If there were to be a hospitalisation I'd get a phone call immediately.

Mojisola

ljonski wrote: »

Also my cousin told me that when she visits she rings ahead to tell them to tell my mum that she is coming. They didn't tell her and the same thing happened to me last year.

It is simply not good enough for them to tell her (if they do) that she is having a visitor without ensuring that she repeats to them what has just been said to her.

As i say, she is completly lucid, although her last illness through lack of sodium in her system apparently makes her a bit confused!
Thanks

Why does she need to be told that a visitor is coming, especially if she doesn't take it on board immediately?

ljonski

As i have said she is lucid and understands everything that is said to her providing she can hear it. She would definitely want to know if she was due a visitor especially if that visit meant a short journey out. Im afraid your attitude is the attitude that i am trying to avoid happening in the staff. Mum is highly intelligent and has great insight into the character of people. She is fully human and deserves to be treated as such.

Besides, both my cousin and I made specific requests to the staff that mum should be informed of our arrivals and as we have no other way of contacting her directly,then there should be no problem....unless you of course know different?

tea_lover

I genuinely don't understand the issue with visits (nor the tone of your reply - getting @rsey with people on here isn't going to help).