The NHS

[Bookworm]

I would thank you for that post, which confirms my point of view, except for that last paragraph...

 

I happen to be in contact with a lot of people all over the country who look after someone in need of assistance, and the general consensus about direct payments is that it has been a complete shambles for most.

Now, I haven't got the details at this point, because I didn't really look into it, but if anyone's interested, I can check it out and report later.

[lynzpower]

bookworm,

 

Id appreciate that please, the more info I have the better.

 

one sticking point I know happens is that people have DPs adn then struggle to find carers. And there are hassles with understanding NI/ sickpay & other rights as employers.

 

Where I work, we do not dish out DPs to people who are unable to understand them, (which weve been rapped for, not high enough takeups apparently) but I know that is not the case in other LAs.

[bankoff]

Thank you Robbo

 

I am glad I am not the only one here that thinks Gran and Grandpa should NOT have to pay TWICE. Altzheimers and dementia are both recognised as mental illness, they don't always affect the very old.

 

I thought National Insurance was exactly what it says it is "Insurance against being ill". We all pay it, we all use it.

 

You don't crash you car, then get told you have to pay for it yourself, as you have already paid the insurance, so you make the claim. You pay car insurance year after year, some people have a claim in their lifetime of driving, but lots don't. I cannot see what the difference is here.

 

Its unfortunate that some people get sick and some don't.

 

My mother was never sick in her life. She had all her children at home, and has never cost the NHS a penny. Now when she needs it she's got to pay again, where is the fairness in that.

[lynzpower]

Heres a couple of links Ive found for general advice for consumers.

 

http://www.nhfa.co.uk/modules/standard/viewpage.asp?id=174

http://www.rcn.org.uk/publications/pdf/rcn_nhs_continuing_care.pdf

 

Im going to have an ask around at work on continuing care packages ,how they tend to be applied and then come & report back. I sense this is a contentious issues, and see what I come up with.

[bankoff]

Hi Lynzpower

 

Think you should also look at this, but from the sound of it you do not appear to go after people's properties!!!!!!!!

 

Your lady with the big house who wants overnight care should be paying for a private carer, like we did. My bone of contention is when they are mentally ill and incapable of doing anything for themselves it is a case for continuing care which should be provided for by the NHS.

 

The people who run the site below have taken SS to court and got their money back!

 

http://www.nhscare.info

[lynzpower]

Thanks for that. Thing is with the lady in her big house, she doesnt have the cash in the bank to pay for it. So, my personal opinion is, well she should sell her house then, but my professional opinion is that, provide where you can, unless there is a bloody good legal reason why you cant provide.

 

Thanks for the site, Ill have a nosey round it.

[bankoff]

Hi Lynzpower

 

Hope you have now had a good look around the site.

 

The matron clobbered me yesterday, saying my mum was a bed blocker.

 

So I promply handed her the flyer from the front page of the site.

 

Power to the people!!!!!!

[breadline]

Hiya

Just thought i would update my post.

 

We found are elderly friend of 96, who got lost in the constant closure of nursing homes, she has now been moved a total of 10 times in the passed 15 years and in that time she has also broken her back and now needs constant aid.

 

So it doesnt matter what you sell as they still have no where to put you..

 

BL

[chaos5678]

I'm with you on this one Bookworm.

 

I work as a carer, and I see no reason why property shouldn't be sold to pay for care.

 

As long as there is nobody left living in it, then why not?

 

The word "home" is used a bit emotively I think, as surely it changes from being a home to a house once someone leaves it for good.

 

I'd be more that happy to sell my home if I moved into a residential home, after all It's no different to selling and moving to another house, except from the inheritance aspect

[Templehead]

you pay NI to cover yourself in these situations end of story.

1948 health care act covers you from "cradle to the grave" so you should nt have to pay for it again. The attitude you ve got a house, you sell it to pay for your care after a lifetime of paying mandatory NI contributions is a disgraceful. You shouldnt have to lose your house for care you were promised when you started paying NI, least of all to lose your house that you ve spent all your life paying for as well! Why not include a care clause in your mortgage? or health insurance if thats the thinking. No, its ok for George Best to get a new liver, or for drunks to cause no end of bother on saturday night at A and E, but granny s got to sell her house so that so someone will look after her when she gets ill-worse still call it social care and pretend it doesnt exist!

[chaos5678]

But you're not paying just for care,

 

NI contributions aren't meant to pay for heating, lighting and food etc all your life, only the care part of it.

 

It's a home for you with care thrown in, you're buying a home for yourself with the weekly fees,

[Templehead]

so when i am in hospital next i m going to get a bill for all the heating and lighting that was used whilst i was there? and the food too

 

its nice to see the NHS staff are on the patients side

[bankoff]

I welcome your reply Templehead. Its time somebody realised what this government and the NHS is up to.

 

They are trying to make my mother pay twice. Why should she?

 

Why should the drunks and druggies get treated for free and nice old ladies have to pay twice.

 

Its the very principle, if you work hard and save hard, you have to pay twice!

 

If this country looked after its own, instead of everyone elses refugees, it would be a better place to live in.

 

 

MOD NOTE: I'LL ACCEPT REASONED ARGUMENTS, NOT FULL BLOWN RANTS. YOU ARE IN DANGER OF FALLING IN THE 2ND CATEGORY. IF YOU NEED TO VENT THAT KIND OF ANGER, I'M SURE THE BNP ARE ALWAYS LOOKING FOR RECRUITS.

[chaos5678]

But you're not asked to sell your house to pay for your stay in hospital are you? You do get that for free.

 

and hospital won't normally be your home for the rest of your life will it? so I don't really see the comparison

 

And to be honest I don't really see why you shouldn't contribute towards food in hospital, yet again I see NI contributions as payment for the care provided, not bed and board.

[breadline]

you pay NI to cover yourself in these situations end of story.

1948 health care act covers you from "cradle to the grave"

 

Thanks you've explained this , much better than i did.

 

If the government wish to start playing with the promises made in 1948 they need to draw a line under it now and start again.

 

The fact is that people where laid to belive they where secure and if this is not so then, why way back in 1948 and onwards have people been keeping thier homes untill now?

 

The blatent truth is England now has 2 many pairs of feet to accomodate the needs.

 

 

BL

[Bookworm]

I call it the Agincourt effect, or the bottleneck.

 

Back in 1948, no-one could predict the baby-boom of the 60's followed by the sharp decline in birth-rate, and the lengthening age expectancy.

The calculations were made on a pattern where people would have in average x children, live until x age, and the contributions made while you were working would support the older non-workers, and when it was your turn to become a non-worker, the young ones' contributions would help supporting you, and so on.

But things change. First more births, followed by a sharp decline of births. Then people started living longer and longer, requiring care and therefore costs for longer. The 1948 balance just couldn't foresee that.

And of course, the family pattern changed too. Whereas children would look after their elderlies unless they had no other alternative, often living all under the same roof, nowadays, that part of care has largely disappeared, leaving the greater burden of care on the state.

 

If you think that's grim, think forward to about 25 yrs time: the baby boomers (now in their 40s) will come to retirement age. The contributions paid by the generations after (with the birth rate decline accelerating) can not cope, that is simple maths. THAT is the real pension/care time-bomb. What we see now is nothing by comparison.

 

I'm not going to get drawn into a debate on immigration which doesn't belong here, but just think on these:

1 - There are more people EMIGRATING from Britain than IMMIGRATING each year.

2 - It may well be that those immigrants, with their large families of children who will grow up to be workers tomorrow, actually WILL BE the solution to the oldies time-bomb. Because there simply aren't enough British babies being made to cope.

[breadline]

But at the end of the day the people suffering today where told they would be cared for.

 

Sadly they also belived thier children would be to.

BUt we know we wont be.

 

Atleast look after the ones that where lied to.

[Templehead]

But you're not asked to sell your house to pay for your stay in hospital are you? You do get that for free.

 

and hospital won't normally be your home for the rest of your life will it? so I don't really see the comparison

 

And to be honest I don't really see why you shouldn't contribute towards food in hospital, yet again I see NI contributions as payment for the care provided, not bed and board.

 

 

care means the whole thing, care means caring for someone in a home with adequate heating, lighting food and medical attention as needs be. I dont see why when one is admitted to hospital/residential home you should pay for food, lighting, heating because you ve narrowed down care to simply the staffs time. With the logic of what you ve said, NI contributions should only cover you to have a nurse or doctor examining you with no bed or heating or food. That wouldnt be care at all, that would mean something completely different-i m not really sure what it would mean at all, partial care at best

 

NI contributions are mandatory so there s no getting out of it. If the government think that we re getting some kind of bargain deal on our health and they cant afford it, then NI contributions should go up. But that would be ludicrous as we pay 47p per litre on fuel in tax, energy tax, income tax, council tax, inheritance tax and VAT. When you think about it i m sure we will all have contributed vast amounts to the government coffers in a variety of taxes thoughout our lives.

 

So now when one gets ill, i think the NHS should do what it was set up to do. Not make us sell our home and brainwash its staff into making us feel like scroungers or calling elderly people "bed blockers" excuse me whilst i puke.

[chaos5678]

Sorry, you've lost me there.

 

I work for a care agency and as an example, I am currently spending 48 hours a week in a clients home, she has dementia and is bedridden.

 

I am only a part of the care package supplied, the lady has 24hr care, paid for by the"state"

 

To get to my point, even with the impresive amout of care this lady and her family receive, she still has to pay for her heating, lighting and food, it would be absurd to think that just because she receives care, then she shouldn't have to pay for food.

[Templehead]

you ve lost me now as well, we re talking about when someone is not well enough to be looked after at home. When they have to be put into a residential home is what i m talking about. I m not talking about when they receive care at home.

[chaos5678]

There are very few people not "well eniugh" to be cared for at home, 75% of my work is actually carikg for the terminally ill at home.

 

 

As a taxpayer, I have no objection at all to anyone having any amount of medical care at taxpayers expense, but I see no reason why, I should pay their living expenses when they have the means to do so.

 

That merely leaves less "in the pot" for medical care.

[bankoff]

The living expense side of things is paid for by the elderly patient.

 

Their pensions are taken away after a certain period, and they are left with £18 per week to buy all toiletries, clothing, etc.

 

The argument here is should the elderly pay again for NHS Care. Effectively they are paying twice. In 1948 the government decreed that there would be free NHS care for all from the cradle to the grave.

 

It should make no difference who you are and what happens to you. Some people never need any care whilst others do. Why should one pay nothing and the other pay twice?

[Templehead]

There are very few people not "well eniugh" to be cared for at home, 75% of my work is actually carikg for the terminally ill at home.

 

 

As a taxpayer, I have no objection at all to anyone having any amount of medical care at taxpayers expense, but I see no reason why, I should pay their living expenses when they have the means to do so.

 

That merely leaves less "in the pot" for medical care.

 

 

i m sure there s a few that do, this was shown in the panorama document. It also detailed how the NHS staff had been misled about what the law said. It was like a mass collusion to misrepresent the law to patients in order that they go thro with the home robbery. Through the training of admin, doctors, managers and even nurses who all thought that the law was that you had to be means tested to see if you would need to pay for residential care, when it s quite clearly stated in law that you dont have to pay for care. The coughlin case proves that as well. I just dont see why a person should pay twice,for care if they need to reside in a care home. If you re in hospital you do not pay for the care package of food, heating, bed, board etc and i dont see why you should pay if you need to go into a home either.(which is essentially a non emergency hospital)

[chaos5678]

you ve lost me now as well, we re talking about when someone is not well enough to be looked after at home. When they have to be put into a residential home is what i m talking about. I m not talking about when they receive care at home.

 

 

Just as a matter of interest, residential homes do not, or rather should not supply any medical care, thats for registered nursing homes only to provide.

 

Residential homes are just communal homes and I don't see why the taxpayer should pay bed and board if the resident can afford their own fees.

 

The pension should be used for living expenses, thats what it's for surely

[breadline]

Just as a matter of interest, residential homes do not, or rather should not supply any medical care, thats for registered nursing homes only to provide

 

This is so true and so abused by the system which has been cutting corners as far back as i know since 1974 and no dout a long time before.

 

Residential homes have never only been residential homes, the position of these homes has been abused for years as have the employees who work in them, when they are given sick patience to have to care for there time is stretched passed its limits.

On top of the physical abuse inflicted by the mentaly ill who need constant care and are placed in residential homes.

 

no wonder the employees go private.

BL