Continuing Health Care - Preparing to fight PCT's decision

margaretclare

Just a further point.

Urinary tract infections are depressingly common in the older age-groups and there can be several predisposing causes. Lack of hygiene and lack of mobility are obvious ones, but UTI can also cause confusion, and if the UTI is treated then the confusion may also disappear. Confusion is one of those blanket terms which you hear bandied about with little understanding.

DH was admitted to hospital mid-October with what turned out to be septicaemia from which he nearly died. He doesn't remember what happened the day or two before his admission, doesn't remember the paramedics coming or being admitted and doesn't remember much about the first week at all. That's not because of anything wrong with his memory, but simply that he was too ill. During that first day, when he was resisting having lines put into his veins, I was asked 'are you his carer?' I denied this, saying I was his wife. 'Is he usually as confused as this?' was the next question. I said 'No way - he's a very intelligent man and has all his marbles'. It was obvious from the way people looked, and talked, that they thought his confusion was 'normal' for his age.

Trebor16

ADASS (Association of Directors of Adult Social Services) published their own document in October 2007 about continuing care and what the local authorities should be doing to challenge the NHS decisions. I actually did a Freedom of Information request to Suffolk County Council just under a year ago and asked them in how many cases they had actually appealed against the decisions made over the previous 3 years by NHS Suffolk (and their predecessor PCT's) and the answer was............



ZERO!!!!!

It was a disgusting response and proof that the local authorities have been more than happy to deprive familes of their assets than to fight unlawful decisions made by the NHS when refusing to fund continuing care in cases where they should have been.

monkeyspanner

We were pointed to the ADASS document by one of the few NHS staff who seemed to understand the system, it offers a pretty balanced view, but there is a big difference between best practice and what is actually happening day to day.

In our experience LA Social Services always take the easiest course which involves the minimum work and if this means they don't have to use their care funds and the patient pays well that is fine by them. Why mention CHC funding when that will just complicate things for the LA, it is so much easier for the LA to let you think self-funding is the only available course. As far as the NHS is concerned well they just want to avoid paying at all costs.

In my MIL's care home she was the first resident to claim and be awarded CHC funding within a few months the care home manager had helped two other residents obtain funding. The PCT's response a few weeks later, they informed the care home manager "we are going to do an emergency review of all CHC funded cases in your home". In all cases the funding had been in place only a few months.

monkeyspanner

netsmurfit wrote: »

@ monkeyspanner:T

many thanks for allowing us to post on your forum as we are in the same battle as others here, please feel free to pay us a visit @ http://freenursingcare.findtalk.net/index.htm

Together we can share a wealth of information to reach others who sadly day in day out are being ripped off by this unlawful scam, Perpretrated by the N.H.S And local authorities Social Services

Regards
mick

Hi Mick
You are very welcome. New input and a fresh view on things is always useful.

Errata

Together we can share a wealth of information to reach others who sadly day in day out are being ripped off by this unlawful scam, Perpretrated by the N.H.S And local authorities Social Services

Information is always valuable. What would be even more valuable is if working age adults campaigned and lobbied for the care of older people to be funded properly and fairly. The likelihood of that happening is vanishingly small as most people don't pay attention to things until they are directly affected by ithem.

margaretclare

Trebor16, you said that a social worker started to go on about you being self-funders. How did s/he know that?

We had a friend from church who developed vascular dementia, TIAs etc. It all seemed to happen over a fairly short period of years, but what happened was that he was treated first in the local psychiatric unit, first on a day-care basis, then admitted for respite, then permanently. When a new NHS EMI opened in this area he was admitted there and he ended his days there about 3 years ago. He was younger than us, we remember him still preaching at church, and that was in the first year or so of this century.

My point is, all this treatment was completely under the wing of the NHS mental health services. There could have been no question of them paying anyway - both been church workers, notoriously ill-paid, no property to sell or anything like that.

netsmurfit

Errata wrote: »

Information is always valuable. What would be even more valuable is if working age adults campaigned and lobbied for the care of older people to be funded properly and fairly. The likelihood of that happening is vanishingly small as most people don't pay attention to things until they are directly affected by ithem.

Ditto

If only people would come together in large numbers instead of sitting on the fence, We could make a big noise and lobby for justice one day out of our lives for justice for all sick disabled elderly and frail people, We could have this massive theft stopped

This week another case was won in the high courts concerning people with learning disabilities
Here
Hundreds in line for care money


About 200 people in Cornwall with learning disabilities could be in line for payments towards their care.
It follows a High Court ruling that Cornwall County Council unlawfully charged a man for his care.
The man, referred to as Mr B, has learning disabilities and would have had to hand over his entire income for care which should have been free.
Richard Scrase, the solicitor acting for Mr B, said the judgement would affect 200 people like his client.
Care failings
The middle-aged man with learning difficulties, from the Newquay area, lives in sheltered accommodation.
He has been living there for more than 15 years and, until last year, had the full amount of his care costs covered by the Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly Primary Care Trust (PCT).
His problems began in 2008 when he was transferred from the care of the PCT to the care of Cornwall County Council.
The re-organisation was prompted by a Healthcare Commission investigation in 2005 into the care of people with learning disabilities after "significant failings" were found at Budock Hospital, near Falmouth, run by the PCT.
'Unlawful' decision
Mr B was told he would have to contribute £68.50 a week towards the costs of the 24-hour care package he needs.
A High Court judge said on Monday that the council had simply failed to "engage" with the man's parents before reaching an "unlawful" and "defective" decision to make him contribute towards his care.
Mr Scrase told BBC News after the case that the council had assessed 200 people for payments.
Some like Mr B had refused to pay, while a "good number" had been charged an interim figure of £30 a week which should be paid back, the solicitor said.
Mr Scrase said: "The evidence indicates that the approach the council gave to B is the same as for the 200, so the council must concede that too was unlawful."
The council said in a statement that it accepted many of the criticisms made in the judgment and apologised.
Corrective measures had already been put in place to deal with the errors, the council added.
It said: "Although judgment in this case only concerned one individual claimant, the council would like to underline once more its desire to genuinely engage with all service users about their charges."

BTW I would have posted the link to the story only it was blocked as i am a new member??

This is encouraging news, as alzhimmers/dementia sufferers also suffer the same fate learning disabilitys/difficulty's due to their brain deseas something that the N.H.S And local authorities willingly overlook in their unlawful assesments

Mick

margaretclare

Mick, I agree with you. However, to do this would require a huge turn-around in the way money is spent in this country.

It is said that the first duty of a government is to defend and protect its own people.

In order to carry this out we should have to stop the flow of foreign aid to other countries, some of which are no particular friends of ours.

We should also have to place a massive brake on the amount of hand-outs to people who come to this country from elsewhere. Even if they are from other EU countries with less of a 'welfare state' and poorer pension provision. The people who are now growing older and needing care are the ones who paid into the system, who did what they were told, worked in industries that no longer exist and believed what they'd been told, that they would be taken care of.

I have often said that I wouldn't mind using the value of my house to live on, if I no longer needed the house to live in as it stands. However, I cannot see the difference between the care and treatment a stroke victim needs and deserves, and the care and treatment my DH has had in the last few months. What he has had must have cost an absolute fortune and no one in the NHS has been other than willing to pay it. Just one example which was part of it - daily intravenous antibiotic administered by the District Nurses which went on for weeks, from mid-November to mid-February. Surgical reconstruction of his knee joint by a senior consultant - the 4th attempt on that knee since 2003. He and I have certainly had our money's worth out of the NHS over the years, even since we got together in 1997, it has been a lot of 'in sickness and in health'. No one has ever questioned this or hinted that it might not be worth it in view of our age. Why then should a stroke patient be treated differently?

Trebor16

margaretclare wrote: »

Trebor16, you said that a social worker started to go on about you being self-funders. How did s/he know that?

.

Margaret,

SS had been involved in providing care at my parents house before they had to sell it and moved into very sheltered accomodation. They didn't know the exact figures but knew they had money.

Nice of them to fail to tell us about NHS continuing care. Just as well I knew about it

Errata

Trebor16 wrote: »

Nice of them to fail to tell us about NHS continuing care. Just as well I knew about it

I doubt they're often telling themselves about it for the people that aren't self funding whose fees are paid by the LA's.