Grandmother keeps calling Emergency services

Must surely have been dementia. The person can’t remember anything from one minute to the next. My DM used to phone my poor brother up to 30 times in one hour. It stopped only after she finally moved to a care home.

It does sound as though she gets frightened on her own, which is understandable when you are old and worry about your health. If she is lonely AgeUK can be helpful with choosing a care home etc.
They also offer a befriending service who will phone lonely people regularly for a chat.
Sometimes local SS or if her GP has a social prescriber they might be able to suggest some sort of drop in cafe/daycare, sometimes with transport provided. It might be a distraction and someone to talk to other than emergency services.

She’s lonely i expect. A care home would be better for both of you.

I think you’ve had some very good advice already, i just wanted to add a bit more.

For you it might be worth joining the local Carer’s Hub. They have a good knowledge of what’s available in the area, for instance in our twos there is a lunch club twice a where they can get a two course lunch and some company for £5 a session and they’ll even pick you up and drop you off if you need it.

Does she have attendance allowance? If not I’d apply for that now as it can help to pay for some extra things like a local daycare centre. You’ll need to speak to her SW, talk about the 999 and ask for theor advice on how to reduce them. In our area there are daycare centred for the elderly but the SW has to refer you.

Have you joined the Sight Loss Charity in her area too? They usually have social events and can help her try out different equipment.

And next time she mentions going into a care home say “get your coat, we’ll go and have a look now” I would look at the the CQC reports and google reviews for the homes you’re interested in first though.

Old age must be frightening. As vulnerable as a baby but without parents to care for you. And knowing the inevitable is drawing closer. I imagine our bodies are painful at that age. Would she be happier if she wasn’t living alone?

I do think the pros and cons of an home are quite personal, and what your mum says may need a bit of interpretation. What has been important for my mum is -

• close to at least one of us, preferably 15 mins or less away (but we are pretty much her only visitors - different if she has an established local circle or wider family)
• a manager that you like and connect with (I would put this over anything else tbh, and trust your instincts), and a team who make it easy to communicate. This is gold dust imo and surprisingly hard to find
• a room with some kind of natural view from the bed, +\- ability to get outside to some garden space that is not just an extension of the car park, next to the main road or next to a brick wall - this was particularly important to my mum who prefers plants to people
• staff who stay a long time - ie are well treated
• food that bears some relationship to stuff you’d want to eat
• a soundscape that is bearable and shows some thought - NOT a circle of victims in a room being pummelled by Smooth FM or Disney movies at top volume without any consideration of what could actually work for people of that age, hearing needs and wishes.

I’m a nurse and see a lot of elderly patients with alerts on their medical records stating they’re known for being frequent callers. They have a red star next to their name prompting you to click down and it tells you 😬 it’s very sad as a lot are lonely as the cause but it does tend to cause problems. I’ve seen many ambulance services and hospitals write to gp’s concerned that it will get to a ‘cry wolf’ situation where they genuinely need help

Aside from probable cognitive issues (it would be unusual to reach 98 without any) you say she is registered blind and lives alone, so it is not surprising if she gets lonely, anxious and/or confused. In a care home she would have constant company and supervision, and whenever she feels anxious or upset there will be someone there to reassure her.

Older people with cognitive issues tend to 'over interpret' every ache and pain. My mother was constantly calling the GP, or an ambulance, because she thought her indigestion was a heart attack, or her headache was a brain tumour. When she moved to a care home all those worries went away because the staff could reassure and distract her. Of course if she was genuinely ill they would call for medical help.

If you want to consider a residential placement, ask Social Services for an updated care needs assessment and stress that you think she is at risk being on her own at home.

My mum was dreadful for this it was every week. When she got older and could no longer domineer and bully everyone she would cry wolf to emergency services. Someone on here assured me it was quite usual and they marked certain numbers.
She quickly became abusive to call handlers and emergency staff if they didnt come quick enough or do what she wanted, it was really embarrassing. My mum wanted unpaid slaves, she believed my dad paying tax entitled her to public services. We were neglected as children so we didnt feel inclined to run around after her.

Your relative sounds a bit lonely as opposed to just entitled and bored like my mum. I arranged local volunteers to visit for company but she was awful to them as well! lots of local groups do visiting, check with age concern and local fb pages, I found great help just googling.
One thing it has taught me is to make plans for advanced years, downsize, have hobbies, friends, pet, oldies social groups and stay active if I dont want to be lonely or a burden to others.

I had similar with my Mum phoning 999 for my Dad. She'd do this if he'd had a bad night's sleep and that had made her tired, hoping he'd get taken into hospital.

She kept refusing to put him in a home and what she actually seemed to want was for me to go and provide care, which was a complete non starter as my own kids were quite young and I had a job.

It started off that he'd get taken in then the paramedic refused as there was nothing they could do to help.

It eventually got resolved by the GP saying my Dad needed to go to a care home and keeping him in hospital until a place was found.

Even after my Dad was in a home with appropriate medical support, Mum would also do stuff like go to the GP surgery and sit there hoping to catch him coming in from house calls.

Your local ambulance service will have a frequent caller task force most likely. Contact them and discuss what can be done.

Could you tell her about the Silver line OP? It's a 24/7 helpline run by Age UK that can provide some emotional support and companionship over the phone: Silver Line

I used to signpost to it a lot where I previously worked in a role providing information and advice to older people. I've heard good things about it - hope it helps.

Could an Alexa, or Google be useful at all? Voice activated that she could talk to and ask questions of?
Never heard of anyone use something like this but just an idea.

My mum was so angry with me for suggesting that last summer. I only suggesting looking - not booking her in. It's very difficult if they are very independent. I now know if a crisis happens - she will need to go whereever has spaces - she wont like it. My sibling has the PoA so perhaps they will have a different point of view.

Thank you to your sister and her colleagues for caring. My elderly mum (age 90) had an ambulance turn up a few months ago. She has a pendant and a care line (they're great). She hadnt answered the phone fully when they called - crackly line - she thought it was a scammer and put the phone down. Well good-ish. But an ambulance crew - I felt sad about the waste of resource. But she is managing to live independently - perhaps that is the cost of having elderly competent-ish adults living independently, rather than in a care home.

Start looking for nice care homes in a convenient area. They vary a lot and the good ones often have waiting lists. Much better to find a nice home and have a planned move than have a crisp and have to take any place.

Well can you not research pros and cons yourself? She’s 98, it would be highly unlikely that she’s going to live another 20 years. She’s lonely so I think a care home would be the best option

Her name will most likely be flagged if she’s repeatedly doing it. They still would have to send an ambulance out if they thought she needed one but she may not be taking seriously if she’s ever genuinely ill. Does she have kids? Other people to help her?

Do you think she's lonely? It's great she has visitors but what can she do when she fancies a chat and no ones there. There may be services she can call for a chat.

My friends nan was berieved a few months back and was very lonely despite frequent visits - she was used to having him there to talk at 24/7. They have sorted her out with an Alexa speaker thing and apparently they have chats about the weather, what best to have for dinner, figure out what year so and so sang whatsit, alsorts of mundane things. Also useful for emergencies to call someone.

My dad was doing this for my mum - she did have a lot of health problems as well as dementia and he just got himself worked up about things. At the time there was a team set up in their area to keep frequent flyers out of hospital (it was brilliant, but short lived due to funding even though it must have saved amazing amounts) and they helped me make a flow chart which was stuck on the wall for dad to follow so he could make good decisions and contact the right person. It worked really well

My mother was like this - going into a care home was the best thing that happened - basically they get scared on their own and there is no one immediately there to reassure them.

My mum was in an extra care facility, with five care cals a day. She'd dial 999 when she pressed her buzzer at night and a carer didn't come straight away (there was one overnight carer for the whole building overnight).

In the end (after the fifth time and three entirely unnecessary late night hospital admissions) a note was put on her record (she was identifiable by her phone number) and the handler would call the carer, or me or my brother, to suss out why whether there was a genuine reason to send anyone out. She knew to say the magic words 'chest pain' but when I got the calls from the handler and called mum, it turned out that she wanted something and the carer hadn't come yet.

I told her that when she really needed 999 they wouldn't believe her because of all the crying wolf, but she didn't care.

Good luck.

Is she lonely or bored? Even with visits 4 times a day that is a lot of time where she isn’t seeing anyone and if she’s on her own she probably feels quite isolated. Does she have any hobbies she can do from home? Perhaps adult colouring, television shows, reading etc. The emergency services will be used to this, don’t let it stress you out.

I dont know about the ambulance service, I work in a police control and we have a lot of numbers/addresses with a marker on saying if Mrs Smith calls contact Nok Joe Smith on 077.... before making contact. If we can't get nok if its one of our regulars we give them a quick call but dont send anyone out.

I'm not sure that ambulance control can do that - next time she's phones she might really be ill - but it might be worth asking if they can contact you initially to see if they are actually required.