Residential rehab after hip replacement?

[river1]

My mother (81) is hopefully receiving a hip replacements in 2 weeks. She is currently immobile (been waiting v long time) and has multiple other health issues. My parents house is not suitable for rehab (she sleeps downstairs in the dining room atm) and my father is not going to be able to cope, even with the extra help they currently have. I am not local. Ideally, in order to maximise chance of her getting any degree of quality of life back, she needs to be somewhere with proper rehab support on a daily basis, physio etc.

Do places like this exist or is the only option a care home that offers convalescent packages (where i am worried she won't get enough encouragement to move)?

Anyone been through something similar? Any ideas?

thanks

The ward staff and therapists should be looking at local community rehab beds, they do exist. The other option could be home with adaptations and a enablement package which is 6 weeks usually with carers and therapists coming in or like you say a residential home for a few weeks. Speak to the ward manager and ask if they are having a discharge meeting planned.

Thanks HappyHammy,
We don’t really want to leave it til after op as it will be too late to get anything sorted. Rehab at home not ideal for multiple reasons, even with help, if necessary we need to consider private options but not sure what exists beyond care homes which may not offer enough rehab?

She might be ok in a residential home, physio's do visit clients there. I would explore the community rehab. Wherever she goes it doesnt always mean intensive rehab, maybe a physio visit once a day during the week, be shown exercises. They may also need to look at future plans once she is home.

They do exist but generally social services are reactive rather than proactive so they won't plan any services until she has actually had the op.

Her options then depending on how well her recovery goes could be short term residential care, residential rehab or rehab at home.

It's one of those situations where you just have to let the cogs of the state services turn unless you have the cash to pay for private rehab.

Thank you all. Apparently the consultant has said she should go to the small local hospital after discharge so that’s good news. Not sure how long for though.

My 77yo dads gp suggested pre op that he could go to the local cottage hospital after his hip op. In reality he was discharged from the main hospital with no plan at all and no one from the nhs contacted him afterwards, not even once. He told the physio when being discharged that he lived on his own, and the physio just said you’ll cope . Be wary that you might face a fight if you want the nhs to arrange/pay for proper aftercare.

Mascarponeandwine, thanks for the warning and sorry to hear that

My mum went to a small cottage hospital following a hip replacement. She was there for 4 weeks in total as it had been a bad break and not a planned hip replacement. Physio every day until she was discharged.

If the consultant has told you there's a community hospital she will go to after the hip operation, then great, I'd trust the consultant and ask about this after the op to ensure it happens. She will have the best rehab there as they'll need her walking again to be able to discharge home and also to look at her home environment (an OT does this on home visit once she's nearly fully rehabbed). If you choose instead to move her to a private residential home, you'll struggle to get local community care team (physics nurses OTs) to provide the same level of rehab and you'll face issues around whether care home out of their small area patch and might not be able to access it.

Some areas, where they no longer have community hospitals available, may have rehab residential homes which have up to 6 week stays agreed on block NHS/LA non chargeable joint funded basis
The local community hospitals tend not to have a deadline, the re-enablement (rehab) residential beds do.

Thanks. sorry only just seen these replies. My mother ended up being sent to the local cottage hospital for 2 weeks (plus one week in main hospital) and has now been sent home. It remains to be seen how this will go.....