Discharge planning.

[Toddlerteaplease]

My elderly friend who has been struggling for a while, and absolutely point blank refused to do anything to help himself or get help, has been admitted to hospital as a social admission. He's having a few tests. But I suspect will be medically fit fairly soon. However he's just not safe to go home. His flat is in an awful state and he's not very mobile. This exact scenario is going to keep repeating elf. As he will let him self go again. He does have full capacity. But it extremely stubborn.

What do we need to be asking for?

I think Adult Social Setvuces will help, but they can only do that if he’s willing.

My mum’s got a couple of friends who refuse to use walking aids and refuse to have rails fixed in their homes.

But nothing can be done if they’d rather totter around precariously.

*services

Where was autocorrect on that one?!

You need to be so asking for a safe duscharge

discharge even

Hopefully this episode will have given him enough of a scare that he will accept the help. He said he was lying in bed praying I'd come and find him. As his phone was being repaired somewhere.

So his son met with social workers yesterday, who feel he can go back to his flat with an intensive support package. However this is probably going to be short term. And I can't imagine carers wanting to work in that kind of environment. And we'll end up back in the same situation inn6 months time. He's minimising his issues and still not helping himself. His son has to go home today, so it's going to be down to me.

I can't do this anymore. I've had enough. I've spent the last few years trying to get him to help himself.
Any love for him has gone and I just want to walk away. I know I won't because I'm too soft.

I have been in a similar situation where the struggling elderly person has one child who lives two hours away. It's been down to me and a neighbour to keep them on their feet - their child saw nothing. It took repeated falls, cleaning up after fecal incontinence and emergency hospital admission for me to say that I was done. My words were the same as yours "I cannot do this anymore, I've had enough".

It is not automatically down to you when his son goes home, if you weren't there then his son would have to step up, he doesn't have to for as long as you are around. You don't need to ask for anything, there will have been an assessment of his father's needs by professionals, they will know better than you what is available/necessary. I would have thought that it would include an alarm (here it's about £20 a month through the council) and a key safe so that someone can get in to him. I'd also make sure that it's the son and not you that they have listed to call, having him woken at 3am will do wonders for showing him the situation. The home from hospital package is for six weeks, if they are having carers go in then there will probably be a key safe fitted for their convenience.

If you don't want things to go on as they are then something has to change. Feel free to message me if you want your hand holding, I know what it's like to feel guilty and trapped.

Thanks, the emergency cleaners are going to non Wednesday to blitz the flat. His son is putting the cost on his credit card. My friend had cash but, because he has a passbook account, he can only get cash out in person. We had this issue last time he was in hospital. I've put my foot down and insisted he gets a current account with a card and bills can be paid by direct debit. I don't mind doing minor jobs. Paying rent etc, but absolutely no more than that. I'm going to have to be very firm with my boundaries. My own parents would have a fit if I do any more.

I've just had a chat with his son, who's effectively washed his hands of him. And passed it back to me. Apparently power of attorney has to be someone local, so that gets the son out of it and I don't want it.

Sounds like you need to step back and be a friend not NOK or a carer. It may have to get worse before others step in. Have a think about what you would like to offer that is reasonable and then communicate that to hospital and son. For example as a friend I am happy to visit once a week for a chat and bring some shopping, I am also happy to be contacted if he is readmitted to hospital as I am local and would be happy to visit. I have POA for a relative that I am not local for so that seems incorrect information from the son.

He's absolutely got to rock bottom already. I've spoken to the nurse and explained the situation. She says she'll pass it on to
The discharge coordinator. I don't blame his son, as there is a lot of issues from his childhood that's causing resentment. But he's his dad at the end of the day.

We had a similar situation with my late DGM who wouldn't listen to reason either. You have to protect yourself, people thus bad just drag others into the shitshow with them.

Problem is, he's saying he'll change etc but I really don't think he will. His bed space is untidy.

The relationship between your friend and his son is not your problem, the fact that his son lives at a distance is not your problem. I'm not saying that these aren't problems but they are not yours to solve. There are other people who should step in but they are less likely to do so if they can see that you are taking care of everything.

People have a choice here, the son, the father and you. The son can choose to be more involved with his father (or not), your friend can choose to accept the help offered to him (or not) and you can choose to be a friend rather than a carer. What the others choose to do is their decision, you have to make the choice that's right for you.

Step right back. Your friend must live with the consequences of their choices and often only when a crisis occurs will SS step in.
Agree with pp. if you don't make different choice songs to protect yourself your friend will drag you down with them. Prioritise yourself.

Yes. You are all right, as a nurse myself I find it really difficult to take that step back. And I don't like the thought of him having no support at all.

(I'm paediatric, so I'm not familiar with how things work in adult land)

There is support on offer though, he'll be getting the home from hospital package and at the end of that there'll be an assessment for ongoing care. If he chooses not to take it up then that is his choice, he has the capacity to decide that for himself.

You're not happy with this situation and if you don't want it to carry on then something has to change. You don't get to decide what other people will do but you can decide what you will do. Personally I don't mind doing shopping, driving and fixing things around the house but I am not doing the garden or any personal care. It's for you to make the decision as to what you are happy with doing and then stick to it. If he has no other support then it's because he's refused SS involvement and as I keep telling my son, actions have consequences.

I popped in to visit on my way home from work. The support worker looking after his bay tonight told me that he's needing changing 5 times a night. He was already wet when I popped in at 7.30 on my way home from work. I'm quite shocked it's that bad.

Apparently power of attorney has to be someone local, That is bollocks. The son is entitled to refuse to be an attorney, but there's nothing saying he can't be an attorney. Either he doesn't want the embarrassment of admitting to you he doesn't want to be involved, or someone has said to him "it'd be better for theattorney to be local" and he's misunderstood.

If you make it clear to everyone that you cannot provide daily care, it will get sorted out, although it may need a crisis to make sure it is. Your best contribution would be to stand back and simply keep an overall eye on him, so SS or GP can be alerted when necessary, and help him talk through decisions and their consequences.

I suspect his son just doesn't want the responsibility either. Which given the history I can sort of understand. And I certainly don't want it. I'm happy to keep meeting for coffee as we do now, and raise concerns. But that's it. If he's incontinent at bight, I really can't see how on earth he can go back to even semi independent living. But I'm going to make myself scarce this week. Corona virus will make this much easier as visiting times have been really restricted.

I'm happy to keep meeting for coffee as we do now, and raise concerns. That's a really valuable function and one that can't be outsourced - it can only be done by a friend or relative. And your ability to do it can be compromised by the effort of getting involved in the outsourceable stuff - shopping, cleaning, personal care etc - really glad that you're able to stand back.

He's still in hospital, his flat has been cleaned and all the furniture disposed of. Can't buy any thing now anyway so he's going to have to stay put. The council OT has only just got in touch, but can't do anything at the moment for obvious reasons.

So he's now been discharged to a nursing home. But the discharge care coordinator from the hospital is banging on and on about buying furniture. (I was amazed at his lack of appreciation for the current situation).
His plan is that my friend goes back to his flat, with 4 carer visits a day. Both myself and his son have said this is just not going to work or be safe. And we'll be back to square one. His plan is to see what happens. I don't think that's a acceptable plan at all.
My friend has also decided that he no longer wants to live alone and doesn't want to go back to his flat. From the limited time with them. I think the care home staff agree is not an option either. What do we do now?

Presumably if he's discharged to a nursing home, the nursing home will be on lockdown?

The official route would be that social services would do an assessment of his needs, if they decided residential care was appropriate they and he would agree on a suitable home. He'd have a financial assessment which would include the value of his house if he weren't going to be living in it, I think there are arrangements to allow time to get the house sold before the Council start demanding any money.

But how any of this works at the moment, I haven't a clue!

You can't be forced to get more involved than you are willing to, and whatever you do, don't put yourself at risk.