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Covid

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Elderly mum collapsed non covid related but lives alone 250 miles away - can I travel to see her

28 replies

ACautionaryTale · 17/04/2020 15:26

I’m really not sure what to do

She’s 76 and in good health but sometimes gets very aneamic die to two medications she takes for arthritis and a slight heart murmur. Neighbours found her on the floor this morning and looks grey and tired. Last time this happened she was so aneamic the hospital thought she had internal bleeding.

I have no family near her other than two elderly relatives who are both in the shielding group.

Anyway, Neighbours are going to check on her and I said to either call her doctors or an ambulance is she’s not looking better or worse. She has really good neighbours - five or six houses will all check on her and help her.

Normally I’d go up and stay for a couple
Of days. I can’t relocate up there for lock down as I work from home and have a lot of IT equipment it’s would be difficult to move for a couple of days.

But I feel really bad at the thought of not seeing her at all as an only child and my dad died a few years ago.

I’m not allowed to go though am I?

OP posts:
Hulahoopqueen · 17/04/2020 15:28

I’d say this would be comfortably covered by the “caring for an elderly relative” clause OP. I hope your mum is ok x

Doyoumind · 17/04/2020 15:29

I think it is permitted if you are looking after someone vulnerable, even though it's quite a distance. Only go if you have been indoors with no outside contact for two weeks so you know you are clear though.

FurryCat1978 · 17/04/2020 15:30

Pretty sure it would come under the Caring for a Vulnerable Person, wouldn’t it? Load the car up and off you go, I’d say. Or could she come stay at yours for a week or so?

ACautionaryTale · 17/04/2020 15:32

Thanks.

I’m going to wait to see what the neighbours say. If they’ve called an ambulance then I won’t go as I won’t be able to see her in hospital anyway (local hospital has a no visitors rule at the moment) so I’d be better placed to help her when she gets out.

I feel better knowing I wouldn’t be breaking the rules if I did

OP posts:
LizzieSiddal · 17/04/2020 15:32

Yes she is vulnerable, so you are allowed to go and help her.

ACautionaryTale · 17/04/2020 15:33

I might talk to her about coming down here for a few weeks

OP posts:
ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 19:36

So I went up yesterday and when we got there we found her nearly out of it. Had no idea where she was or what she is doing. But her leg which has a chronic fungal infection was bright red indicating cellulitis.

Neighbours who were dealing with her (one an ex nurse) realised they should have called an ambulance earlier but didn’t because of her insistence.

We called one. Managed to keep her in one place for the 90 minutes it took ( was surprised it was that quick)

Everyone suspected a stroke given her confusion.

She was whisked off to a and e at 2230

At midnight I called and she’d already been seen and triaged and sent for an mri. Doctor I spoke to said that the only good thing about covid was the general a and e job was easier because it was quiet.

This morning she is up in bed, talking, eating and moaning about the food.

Diagnosis - cellulitis causing an infection which was caught before it became sepsis.

She’ll be in for at least three days most likely five so I’ve come home and will go up again when she gets out for 3-4 days to make sure she’s ok. I can’t visit her anyway. I made sure she went with a phone and a charger so she can keep I. Touch.

Interesting thing - her lung x rays show damage consistent with covid. The doctors believe she has had it but with no symptoms. They don’t believe the damage will be long term. She’s had no temperature, no cough, no feeling grotty just the cellulistis caused by an insect bite she kept scratching on the fungal leg.

So she’s 76, underlying conditions, but symptomless and if she hadn’t had the cellulitis we would never have known.

Which reinforces my belief that at the end of this, when the post Mortem is done, we will find a LOT more people will have had this than not and whilst the death figures are horrible it’s because everyone is getting it at the same time.

I think the whole economic suicide will be shown to be an emotional reaction not a scientific one based on the final outcome.

OP posts:
StrawberryJam200 · 18/04/2020 19:45

Also perhaps illustrates how some elderly may end up very ill or much worse, ie contributing to the raised mortality rates, simply because their children are understandably more hesitant about going to see them under lockdown. And they're the only ones who will be able to persuade the fiercely independent old souls to actually seek medical help!

Glad she's OK.

It's extremely interesting about the discovery of Covid signs on her MRI, OP. Would you mind if I copied yr post to the Worried about Coronavirus thread?

StrawberryJam200 · 18/04/2020 19:46

Or suggest people come over and read your thread?

slipperywhensparticus · 18/04/2020 19:48

Why can't you bring her to you?

LilacTree1 · 18/04/2020 19:48

“ I think the whole economic suicide will be shown to be an emotional reaction not a scientific one based on the final outcome.”

Agree. Probably lots of us have it or had it.
I hope she recovers soon. Cellutitis means having to apply creams etc at home doesnt it, will she be when you’re not round or do you need a carer.

ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 19:51

She can apply all creams and everything else herself. She is completely self sufficient despite everything.

I’m. Just going up because otherwise the hospital won’t discharge her without a care package

It wasn’t an MRI they discovered it on - it was a chest X-ray. The mri was to rule out stroke.

She would not want to come here for more than a week or two - she drives down to visit us regularly but is more than happy to go home after a week to ten days.

There would be two additional deaths added if she had to live here for months

OP posts:
ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 19:54

When o say she has neighbours to help her out it’s only for thing that a 76 year old arthritic woman can’t do like lift trays of 24 cans of vinyl out of her car and into the house, or fix stuff when it goes wrong.

OP posts:
LilacTree1 · 18/04/2020 20:00

“ There would be two additional deaths added if she had to live here for months”
I understand 😂

Oxyiz · 18/04/2020 20:02

Glad your mum is being taken care of OP Flowers

But does this mean we could all have lung damage without any symptoms? That doesn't seem good.

StrawberryJam200 · 18/04/2020 20:16

Absolutely, oxyziz

ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 20:51

They said there was damage and signs of it but that it was REVERSIBLE

Not that she’d have it long term

OP posts:
Inkpaperstars · 18/04/2020 20:53

Wishing your mum a swift recovery. It is fascinating about the lungs. I heard an interview some days back with an NYC doctor and he was saying that not only were a very high (I think 70-80) percentage of patients turning up at the emergency room presenting with covid symptoms, but that those coming in with something else like an injury..when scanned their lungs showed evidence of Covid.

ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 21:19

@StrawberryJam200
Feel free to copy. If anything can dial down the hysteria I’m all for it

OP posts:
StrawberryJam200 · 18/04/2020 21:29

Thanks Cautionary. The Worried about Coronavirus and Data, Graphs and Daily Numbers threads have been very rational (although a few disagreements seem to have broken out on them today).

OhioOhioOhio · 18/04/2020 21:30

I would.

EmeraldShamrock · 18/04/2020 22:21

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

EmeraldShamrock · 18/04/2020 22:24

Did your DM ever have pneumonia?

ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 22:36

No. She’s never had pneumonia.

She’s also not in a covid ward and won’t be moved to one as she has no symptoms. She already knows that if they try to love her to one, she will sign herself out and I will be there to get her

OP posts:
ACautionaryTale · 18/04/2020 22:36

We did that after her last hip operation when they wouldn’t discharge her for a bloody stupid tick box reason.

OP posts: