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To think this is inhumane? A 100 year old in a care home wants to die after being isolated for 8 months

17 replies

HumanFemale1 · 10/11/2020 13:23

metro.co.uk/2020/11/08/doreen-100-wants-to-die-after-eight-months-isolated-in-care-home-13558744/

What we're doing to elderly people in the name of saving them will be seen as a disgrace and elderly abuse by future generations.

OP posts:
Olmec8 · 10/11/2020 13:32

Of course it's inhumane. You'll get people responding who try to justify it but it's unjustifiable. The emphasis on quantity of life over quality of life is completely skewed in the wrong direction.

RegularHumanBartender · 10/11/2020 13:35

She doesn't have covid though, and you need to remember that covid is all that matters.

TheDailyCarbuncle · 10/11/2020 13:35

But the vulnerable must be protected!

Only from covid, nothing else of course. Because covid deaths count, deaths from despair and loneliness don't.

FreezeFloodlit · 10/11/2020 13:47

I do think in this sort of situation it should be more of a personal choice and people should be allowed to take risks if they want, if there could be a way to organise it so that people who don't want to take the risk can be largely unaffected. It is quite obviously counter productive to (perhaps) extend a very elderly person's life by a relatively short time using measures that make them utterly miserable for that time. But it's a sliding scale and presumably there are other people in the home so that also needs to be considered.

My MIL finally had to go into a care home this summer due to Alzheimer's. She was originally only supposed to go in for respite care but quickly deteriorated and will not come home again now. She knew who DH was before she went in, but she's got a lot worse now and she wouldn't know him now. He hasn't been allowed to visit her once and although FIL has been to see her a few times even he isn't allowed any more.

It's a terminal illness, she's not going to get better and she and her husband and children have been robbed of that last chance to have a real connection. She's getting great care from what it seems, but is unable to use phones or Skype or anything and without seeing her family we think she has lost that connection quicker than she otherwise would have. Of course it's a horrible disease in any circumstances and this situation was always going to come eventually but this has felt so particularly cruel. I'm not sure if there was any way to avoid it other than FIL trying to continue to care for her at home, but that really wasn't an option.

Choirbells · 10/11/2020 14:10

But if people have the choice, then they are putting others at risk, not just themselves.

Fanofromanticseries · 10/11/2020 14:27

It's wrong. What can we do about it?

HumanFemale1 · 10/11/2020 15:47

@Choirbells

But if people have the choice, then they are putting others at risk, not just themselves.
Not if those others have a choice. If someone in a care home wants to receive visits obviously their family and friends who are coming to visit are aware of the risks too and are still consenting to the visit...
OP posts:
LemonTT · 10/11/2020 16:12

The staff and other residents are not consenting to the risk.

countrygirl99 · 10/11/2020 16:20

@LemonTT does the 100 year old lady get to consent to loneliness an despair? I've seen in my own family (DH and I have all parents slive aged 82 to 93) how isolation has impacted the frail elderly and it's lead to hospitalisation, a very close shave with death and permanent damage. Every one of our parents has lost mobility or slipped into apathy about life due to being stuck at home.

Dablikeacrap · 10/11/2020 16:23

My beloved neighbour passed away last week.
The last 6 months of his life were miserable and lonely thanks to COVID (I visited him regularly throughout though). He prepared his will with a solicitor standing on his doorstep. He died alone after having no visitors in hospital for the few days he was there. We can’t give him the funeral he deserves. It’s absolutely heartbreaking.

Isadora2007 · 10/11/2020 16:29

What is the alternative? It’s heartbreaking but you can’t allow visits in for one person at the risk of others and workers catching covid...
I wonder if her family HAVE actually offered or asked to have her home.

Fizbosshoes · 10/11/2020 16:41

It's really difficult because you can see both sides. Even if she wanted to see her family if they went indoors they could unwittingly potentially be taking the virus in if they were asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic... and infect other residents or staff. But loneliness and isolation has been a big problem for elderly people for years.

My elderly relative has missed 2 appointments for a heart condition because he is frightened of catching covid while he travels to the hospital.(by taxi) He has left his house maybe 4 times since March, and will probably be at fairly low risk of catching covid as he hasnt been anywhere.....but may be more at risk of heart problems.

Porcupineinwaiting · 10/11/2020 16:57

Anyone who has capacity has the right to leave a care home environment. I'm not sure the have the right to insist that the other residents are put at risk. Person A may be happy to take the risk and want to see family (Im sure at 100 I'd want to too). But what about person b in the next room? Maybe they're only 75 and would rather be protected because they may have another 10 good years? Or person c across the corridor who is shielding? Or person d who has dementia and doesnt understand the choice? The care home has to make decisions on behalf of all residents, and the staff.

WanderlustWitch · 10/11/2020 17:29

Those who are elderly and vulnerable need to be given a choice.

FedUpAtHomeTroels · 10/11/2020 17:42

I think they should initiate the weekly tests for a single family memeber to come in and visit weekly.
Where I work it's usually the husband or wife who visit most often. Some have a child who tends to vist most. Other family members pop in on holidays and birthdays.
If they are tested weekly like staff, and it's a booking system, we could get residents up and dressed for the day and kept in their bedroom in their armchair and visit as long as they wanted that day. They have their own bathrooms, we could take food and drink to them. Off the top of my head in our facility with 30 residents there are about 10 or 12 families who came often. Others live a long way away.
Another home near us has gone to the expense of building a visitor centre in the car park. Heated and ready for family to go in when they book appointments.
Theres really no need to keep them awway like this.

MercyBooth · 10/11/2020 17:47

@Choirbells And yet it was ok to discharge Covid positive residents back into care homes.

There has been so much gaslighting and smoke and mirrors around this issue.

Choirbells · 10/11/2020 19:49

I am a carer in a home, it's absolutely heartbreaking to see to see how isolated they are, but we have to abide by the law and keep everyone safe

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