Am I right in thinking my mother is going to need a lot of care on discharge from hospital

[sasparilla1]

DM is 81 and has various health problems, the main problem causing one being COPD.

Over the last two months, she's now on her third hospital stay - and she's now been in for over 2 weeks. During that time she's been mainly bed bound and has had a catheter in due a bad water infection. Now they're saying she has heart & kidney failure and are using the catheter as a means of measuring her fluid output as she's on diuretics to reduce a lot of the fluid build up.

I really can't see how she's going to be mobile or be able to recover the weeing sensation after 2 + weeks of catheterisation. What do you think?

The weeing sensation will come back, and you could ask if she could be changed to a flip flow valve so she gets bladder filling and that sensation back. But my dad got it back after nearly a year of a catheter.
The mobility thing is harder - why has she been bedbound. Is she unsteady, weak or just not confident?

Part of the discharge process will include OT and physio assessments.

It might be recommended that she,doesn't go straight home but goes somewhere for some rehab first if she has potential to regain some of her mobility. Alternatively rehab/reablement will also be offered at home if she meets the criteria.

If not, then yes it's a discussion about what kind of support she will need at home and possibly considering 24 hour residential care if she has night time needs as well.

My 85 year old FIL had a catheter whilst waiting for prostate operation, he was fine after operation and had no problems, obviously a man, but I wouldn’t think she would have any problems when catheter is out. If she is going to be discharged with catheter, I would ask for a care package to be arranged for carers to come in each day to help with it, but it sounds like this should be put in place anyhow. It’s easier to get this sorted whilst she is in hospital, rather than wait till later and if she can manage at home, you can cancel.

@CMOTDibbler

The weeing sensation will come back, and you could ask if she could be changed to a flip flow valve so she gets bladder filling and that sensation back. But my dad got it back after nearly a year of a catheter. The mobility thing is harder - why has she been bedbound. Is she unsteady, weak or just not confident?

She's been bed bound due to illness, weakness and being unsteady! The last time she was in hospital she had a fall, that was conveniently left off her discharge notes, and pulled all the muscles in her back. She was in a massive amount of pain even with pain killers.

She was home for 2 weeks and was just starting to be able to get to the loo without DF helping her when the respiratory nurse came out and sent her back into hospital!!

She had another fall in hospital yesterday going from commode to bed.

My DF is nearly 80 and has his own mobility issues but has been doing an amazing job with back from me and my sister. They have cleaners (my DDIL!) and we now have a private carer going in once a week. Hoping to be able to increase that if she has the availability.

Stair lift going in this week too!

What stage is the kidney failure?

Stair lift going in this week too

Is there anyway you can postpone the fitting of the stairlift, at least until you've had a discussion with the discharge team about what where she is likely to go on discharge from Hospital abs what the likely prognosis is with the organ failure.

@naesake

What stage is the kidney failure?

Reasonably early stage with the kidneys - it's the heart & COPD that are the big problem

@DominicRaabsTravelAgent

Stair lift going in this week too

Is there anyway you can postpone the fitting of the stairlift, at least until you've had a discussion with the discharge team about what where she is likely to go on discharge from Hospital abs what the likely prognosis is with the organ failure.

We thought about delaying the install, but my father needs it too so he wanted to go ahead.

So she's coming home today!

Basically my parents have both lied about care we have in place, and how we will cope with looking after her. Fortunately the district nurse will be in tomorrow, and I hope that she can help put some care in place.

Regardless of whether my Father wants to or not, he physically can not care for her without ruining his own health! The bloody stairlift is only going to make so much of a difference.

I can help, but I have youngish kids and a full time job.

The community nurse can refer to adult health and care for assessment. However if your DM and DF say they are managing and don't need care help, neither DN nor you can override that

Whoops posted too early

So, wishing you luck. If DM finds she cannot manage at home and DF finds it's too much, you can encourage them to let you ring adult services to ask for assessment and support. The nurse will also talk with them if s/he feels it is difficult for them to manage