Advice on getting care for the old or otherwise ill or disabled..

[john87]

10 minutes ago, Essexlogman said:

Firstly my condolences to anyone who has lost someone or is experiencing this similar situation but 

"A bit lost at the moment" and also not having any control over anything is a horrible situation to find ourselves now personally in, I am just wondering paul1966 was your dad taken to hospital then discharged to a private nursing and was he happy being in there? was it your dads decision to go in and now has decided he wishes to go home? as we are in this scenario now with Mum as she initially went into hospital with fall related injuries as well although on top of that she has mobility issues and is very frail as well, long story short though she ended up contracting two other contagious illnesses  Oh yes and I forgot to mention the other one covid as well being 86 now and recovering from all of that now and being in hospital for three months two of which she has apparently been medically ready to be discharged now, Her partner has seen her three time Me and my Brother have not seen her My Sister got too see her on the day covid was diagnosed so we could not then arrange to see Her. Now it comes to the discharge firstly what we have got to deal with is she does not want to go into a nursing home but wants to go home, Ok fair enough now we are not one to burst someone's bubble hope and all that but their is no way on earth this is going to happen unfortunately Her and Her partner are convinced that it is going to happen, the assessment team have been round to her house and seem to think with a hospital bed, a commode and 2 carers 4 times a day will suffice ( sounds great on paper but with care staff shortages and out in the sticks feel she is a low priority)  but here is the rub the other option would be to go into a self funded private nursing care home closer to her house no problem (which I mentioned she does not want to do) where we could at least visit regularly here is the quandary this is what WE would like and feel the decision is best left to Mum and her partner because it is what she wants all decisions are being made by the NHS and Care Assesment teams so we have had to stop feeling like we are banging our heads against a brick wall and take a conscious step back (as hard as that is) as on the one hand the options seem "clear to us" but not to them I do hope thing's will work themselves out soon Best wishes to everyone 

If you have any direct questions i will try to answer them. Do you want her to go to a home or not. What does she say, what do social services say??

 

john..

[paul1966]

some background info, dad has been living on his own with no problems until last week, he is 92 and a bit wobbly walking now, he fell at home and was took into hospital overnight, he was sent home the next day without a care package which we now know he should have had set up by the hospital. The next day he fell again, again an ambulance attended after waiting 7 hours, they assessed him and said he was ok to stay at home but they did set up a care package that day which meant the following day we had emergency carers 3 times a day. He was given walking aids but refused to use them! we set up web cams to keep an eye on him and we saw him try to walk unaided and fall again.

At this point we knew he could not be left alone as he was not using the walking frame and would fall again, we needed to do work on the bathroom so using building work as the excuse he agreed reluctantly  to go into respite for two weeks, he does want to return home and asks every day when is he going to go home. Hence we now need to find a live in carer to stop with him so he is not alone at night. All this is new to us as up until last week every thing was ok and as we want to get him home asap we need to get something set up.

[john87]

16 minutes ago, paul1966 said:

some background info, dad has been living on his own with no problems until last week, he is 92 and a bit wobbly walking now, he fell at home and was took into hospital overnight, he was sent home the next day without a care package which we now know he should have had set up by the hospital. The next day he fell again, again an ambulance attended after waiting 7 hours, they assessed him and said he was ok to stay at home but they did set up a care package that day which meant the following day we had emergency carers 3 times a day. He was given walking aids but refused to use them! we set up web cams to keep an eye on him and we saw him try to walk unaided and fall again.

At this point we knew he could not be left alone as he was not using the walking frame and would fall again, we needed to do work on the bathroom so using building work as the excuse he agreed reluctantly  to go into respite for two weeks, he does want to return home and asks every day when is he going to go home. Hence we now need to find a live in carer to stop with him so he is not alone at night. All this is new to us as up until last week every thing was ok and as we want to get him home asap we need to get something set up.

ok,, Well you have been right royally bullshitted to..

 

First, the hospital would not devise a care plan, but they WOULD have wanted to be satisfied that he was being discharged to a safe environment.. They would have asked him and he presumably told them he was. They would have no reason to doubt this unless they suspected that he "lacked capacity" [MCA and all that]

 

Did you tell the hospital that he was going to live with you on his discharge??

 

Second time he was admitted, the hospital obviously contacted social services would would have done an emergency assessment, hence the carers..

 

Now,

 

1, who arranged the respite care??

 

2, What is stopping him simply leaving and walking out??

 

3, where are social services now?? You need to be contacting them a bit sharpish as YOU do not need to do anything, THEY do though Your dad needs a proper S9 care act assessment.

 

I would imagine that he will not have had one yet as social services have a POWER but not a duty, to just provide services without having done a proper assessment.

 

I do not understand what you mean about the live in carer, it is for the care home to find staff not you.. What kind of a care home is this?? All sounds VERY strange to me..

 

john..

[headgroundsman]

43 minutes ago, paul1966 said:

some background info, dad has been living on his own with no problems until last week, he is 92 and a bit wobbly walking now, he fell at home and was took into hospital overnight, he was sent home the next day without a care package which we now know he should have had set up by the hospital. The next day he fell again, again an ambulance attended after waiting 7 hours, they assessed him and said he was ok to stay at home but they did set up a care package that day which meant the following day we had emergency carers 3 times a day. He was given walking aids but refused to use them! we set up web cams to keep an eye on him and we saw him try to walk unaided and fall again.

At this point we knew he could not be left alone as he was not using the walking frame and would fall again, we needed to do work on the bathroom so using building work as the excuse he agreed reluctantly  to go into respite for two weeks, he does want to return home and asks every day when is he going to go home. Hence we now need to find a live in carer to stop with him so he is not alone at night. All this is new to us as up until last week every thing was ok and as we want to get him home asap we need to get something set up.

Care provided by social services is chargeable after a means test. Roughly speaking if you have more than £23500 savings then he will need to pay for all his care needs privately. You need to get him assessed for a care plan asap. It is not unusual for care plans to be set up in hospitals but i only know about people that have been in for many months  due to spinal cord injury, Speak to CAB

[paul1966]

17 minutes ago, john87 said:

ok,, Well you have been right royally bullshitted to..

 

First, the hospital would not devise a care plan, but they WOULD have wanted to be satisfied that he was being discharged to a safe environment.. They would have asked him and he presumably told them he was. They would have no reason to doubt this unless they suspected that he "lacked capacity" [MCA and all that]

 

Did you tell the hospital that he was going to live with you on his discharge??

 

Second time he was admitted, the hospital obviously contacted social services would would have done an emergency assessment, hence the carers..

 

Now,

 

1, who arranged the respite care??

 

2, What is stopping him simply leaving and walking out??

 

3, where are social services now?? You need to be contacting them a bit sharpish as YOU do not need to do anything, THEY do though Your dad needs a proper S9 care act assessment.

 

I would imagine that he will not have had one yet as social services have a POWER but not a duty, to just provide services without having done a proper assessment.

 

I do not understand what you mean about the live in carer, it is for the care home to find staff not you.. What kind of a care home is this?? All sounds VERY strange to me..

 

john..

We arranged respite care as we have to sort out what he needs to enable him to stay at home, he could not be left alone. I do not know if social services have been in touch, the emergency carers were not too good, one came one evening when dad was already in bed so they decided he did not need a carer in the evening, we got the impression they wanted to do the least they could.

When i say live in carer i mean that when dad is back home there is a carer in the house day and night to keep an eye on him.

[paul1966]

8 minutes ago, headgroundsman said:

Care provided by social services is chargeable after a means test. Roughly speaking if you have more than £23500 savings then he will need to pay for all his care needs privately. You need to get him assessed for a care plan asap. It is not unusual for care plans to be set up in hospitals but i only know about people that have been in for many months  due to spinal cord injury, Speak to CAB

My dad does have savings above the limit you mention so we are having to pay for all the care he is getting. To be fair the care home he is in is more or less brand new and is more like a posh hotel, having said that at 1300 a week it should be.

[headgroundsman]

1 minute ago, paul1966 said:

My dad does have savings above the limit you mention so we are having to pay for all the care he is getting. To be fair the care home he is in is more or less brand new and is more like a posh hotel, having said that at 1300 a week it should be.

The alternative is to get carer employed by himself but that has problems as he becomes an employer with all the problems that it brings with it. At least if it is provided by social services there is a back up if one carer goes off sick

[john87]

1 minute ago, paul1966 said:

We arranged respite care as we have to sort out what he needs to enable him to stay at home, he could not be left alone. I do not know if social services have been in touch, the emergency carers were not too good, one came one evening when dad was already in bed so they decided he did not need a carer in the evening, we got the impression they wanted to do the least they could.

When i say live in carer i mean that when dad is back home there is a carer in the house day and night to keep an eye on him.

You have gone about things the wrong way i am afraid.. What you SHOULD have done, is to tell the hospital that there is/was nowhere suitable for him to be discharged too. Then they would not have been able to discharge him at all and they would have had to sort out a care home place for him with social services..

 

Despite what social services would have told you, your dad would have had a choice in where to go, the "The Care and Support and After-care (Choice of Accommodation) Regulations 2014" see to that, until that he would have stayed in hospital [unless some covid rule has changed things..]

 

These emergency carers, who was paying them?? who was employing them??

 

You need to contact social services as soon as you can, do it now if you want, there will be someone on duty on the duty desk.

 

The problem you now have, is that social services HAVE to act, they have a DUTY to act, but NOT, when someone else has volunteered to provide support, so you must tell them that you are not prepared to..

 

You might run into a problem where they will refuse to discuss your dad unless he agrees..

 

john..

[john87]

While i think of it, please do not make the mistake of thinking that because a person has more than the capital limit [£23,000 odd] that social services will not get involved or will not help. They have to by law, as after all the care act clearly states that;

 

The duty to carry out a needs assessment applies regardless of the authority’s view of—

(a)the level of the adult’s needs for care and support, or

(b)the level of the adult’s financial resources

 

What will happen, is, if care is provided by the LA, is that such person will be means tested as having to meet the entire cost themselves, a very different thing to just walking away from social services and trying to "row your own boat" as it were..

 

Part of the assessment covers financial matters and social services will help get financial support that is NOT means tested, such as personal independance payments or attendance allowance to which such person may very well be entitled, REGARDLESS of means or income..

 

john..