DM wants a riser-chair costing £4.5k! Advice v welcome

[Valleyofthedollymix]

DM is 82 with moderate dementia. It affects her mobility more than her cognitive abilities but I don't know how much this is to do with the dementia and how much is due to her lack of exercise over many years.

She is currently burning through finite funds by living in a large house with a very expensive live-in carer through an agency. After a lifetime of being careful with money, she's spending like Liberace and it's going to run out, especially since I think she'll live a long time. Frustratingly, the extravagance encouraged by the carer, for example endless new pairs of trousers and cashmere jumpers (one week she bought six). If we query this spending, it gets turned into a black mark against us - for someone with a failing memory, DM can keep a really good tally of the ways in which we've 'denied' her.

Anyway the latest was the carer organising for a bespoke riser recliner chair company to come round to demo. DM apparently 'fell in love' with the deluxe one and has chosen the fabric etc. It costs nearly £4600. This feels like an awful lot to me but apparently, it's tailor made for her spine, size etc.

Does anyone know if this is worth it? Of course, if it's a buy once buy the best situation and it'll change her life, fair enough, we'll find the funds. But I wouldn't spend that sort of money on anything without due diligence. I feel like we're being bounced into it. I'm also unsure of the wisdom of these chairs at all because might it exacerbate my mother's immobility?

So, if anyone has any knowledge on how much you need to spend and what's worth it, I'd be vvvv grateful.

You need to talk to the agency and tell them this has to stop.
Edited to remove a bit because I reread and see you have poa.

Good.

This means you can act in your mum's best interests here and be firm.

YRe the carer- you can't assume people who seem lovely are lovely.

If you could tell, there'd be no such thing as con artists. 🤷

I'd be asking myself how much is she benefitting from your mum's spending?

I totally identify with your post . This was me , I did all the organising for my parents , everything , because I was personally not so good with the personal care side . But did visit every day at the end . Still got thrown in my face though.I also would ask for a second opinion about the chair . I thought you could still get advice from adult social care / occupational therapy even if you have funds ? My Aunt and uncle did ? You are not asking them to pay just recommend the correct chair ? Please tell me you have full power of attorney ?

Get a second hand chair and a new carer op!

I'd keep an eye out for the carer sporting new cashmere jumpers and silk scarves

Me too.
I'd be popping over unannounced to match receipts to items in the wardrobe!

Having responsibility for one late parent and now another with POA for both I honestly think the OP has raised some real concerns. The parent could live for years and there won’t be an unlimited amount to spend like this.

Yes, potentially it’s her money but what if a dodgy charity asked for money or she got a boyfriend who kept asking for money. Would that be OK?

Ideally the carer should be telling you that mum is spending lots of money and is concerned, that she doesn't want the bank card or any responsibility. I would speak to the care agency.

Who is ordering all of this? Is carer saying your Mum requested it or has it been suggested? Surely the carer realised this is not normal behaviour and shouldn’t she be reporting this to you as a concern.

My late Father told me once he wanted to re marry (to one of the carers at the care home). If she knew how much money he had she might well have agreed to do it. He had dementia but never formally diagnosed.

We had a similar situation with a carer encouraging lots of dodgy spending, but it did make my FIL happy.
I would say no to the chair on the basis that it can be unsafe. She needs a proper assessment. Live in carers are very expensive. And it sounds like the carer is as much a servant as a carer. But you have to weigh against the spend your mums happiness.
Set a weekly limit for the card and then ignore any feelings about what gets bought.

It sounds like she may need an independent capacity assessment. If she has the capacity to make the decision then she can do so, even if it is unwise. If she lacks capacity then you have to make spending decisions for her in her best interests, which could include providing the carer with money for food shopping, or you could set up a waitrose (I'm assuming!) delivery with foods your mum prefers to eat etc

I think those saying its her money let her spend what she likes have missed the point. She has dementia and cannot make financial decisions for herself hence the POA being in place. The OP is responsible for making sure her money is managed wisely, not just rubber stamping all her mother's dementia driven decisions. My DH is deputy for an old friend in a care home. We have sometimes had to refuse unreasonable requests for things and have been the bad guys for a time but DH has to report to the Court of Protection every year so has to be able to justify his decision making. Presumably the OP doesn't need to do this but she does have a moral duty to handle her mother's finances in the way she would have (before dementia) wanted and protect her from possible exploitation. If she ends up eventually in residential care it is very very expensive so best not to throw money around unnecessarily now.

I would set her a spending limit per week/month. And no to a £4.5k chair. You can get brilliant ones for a few hundred pounds from facebook marketplace.

It is totally worth it! My mother bought one in her 80s. She is still using it in her 90s - she's had it now for about 10 years. I honestly don't know how she'd manage without it now. Just make sure she gets one with a leather/faux leather seat cover (leaks do happen ...!)

My dads excellent carers recommended one that was a few hundred quid from The Range. Mum and dad both have them now and they’ve been brilliant. There’s absolutely no need to spend that amount of money!

OP, I work in a small business that makes furniture in their own workshops and our fully electric riser/recliner chairs are less than £2.5k and that's in a Colefax and Fowler fabric. £4.5k is a scam, sorry, and "tailor made" in China. Please don't fall for the con, we get so many clients in at work who've fallen for it and the chairs are no better than you buy in HSL.

If she does need extra support in a chair, find a small local upholsterer and explain what you need. Or look for specialist disability chairs online.

The carer should be well aware that they should be flagging the need for a mobility assessment rather than organising private demos ,as certain items have risks attached as well as benefits ( wheeled walkers/ three wheelers, bed rails, riser recliners, mobility scooters are all classics for certain types of accidents/injuries). Riser recliner chairs can be available on the nhs anyway if theres a clinical need .

She's 82, and she's losing control of her mind. You said she had moderate dementia, which suggests she has enough lucidity to know she has dementia and what that means.

I think I'd be worried if she wasn't looking for the joys in life where she could.

I don't enjoy spending money on crap. I might, if there was nothing else I could do instead.

One live-in carer should be under £1500 per week for one person! Carer should absolutely not have any access to bank account. That's really crossing the line and open to financial abuse. The Care Quality Commission would take umbrage with a care company that didn't have a policy against this!
Get the carer a Go Henry card with which she can buy what is needed and you have full control - you absolutely need LPoA if you don't already have it. Carer's food should be budgeted at around £60 per week. Smoked salmon? She's taking the piss.

The riser/recliner chair is around £1500 - any more is not worth the extra.

I researched these
chairs recently. Which? report (you can pay a small amount to read) v thorough and helpful. Surprise surprise v expensive chairs not necessarily best.

@Valleyofthedollymix havent read the thread, but if you are near East Sussex we have a very fancy one that she is welcome to

I don't think there is anything wrong with restricting the spending on a relatives behalf when they clearly don't have full capacity to make sensible decisions. In fact it's your responsibility to do so.

In 10 years time there may be no money left for a full time carer and then that spending will seem reckless so it's a good idea to rein it in now.

I'd try and talk to the carer and agency now as a last warning before simply going elsewhere. I say this because finding good carers is hard. However if this doesn't stop then you have to change because the carer is seriously overstepping and I'd be concerned.

Does she understand that when the money is gone, the live in carer will go too? She's at risk of seriously impacting the level of care she gets when she will really need it.

When she is immobile and incontinent, she will suffer if she has to rely on carers provided by her local Council. There is insufficient funding to provide the kind of care she will need. Even if the Council put a charge against her house, she'll likely only get what is deemed necessary for personal care.

As you have PoA and she lacks capacity, you must act in her best interests, even if she doesn't like it. I have direct experience of this.

Escape is spot on. If someone has dementia and chooses to buy something very expensive for say the carer… is that OK?

@Valleyofthedollymix As others have said, the chair needs to be properly measured for the user. We had one for my late Mum. Bought around 2019. We took her to our local HSL shop and she bought one for around £1500. It was well worth the money. Could be worked either for the reclining bit, or also the riser bit separately. Had a battery for emergencies including powercuts.

The bigger issue is the carer taking on far more responsibility than they should be. They should be discussing with YOU and not your Mum things that she might need and YOU then need to be the one deciding what is a reasonable spend on any item ( including your Mum's clothes), since you have POA. You don't need to be stingy, but that's part of your remit as POA

It doesn't matter how much money your Mum has, you are still entitled to ask your local Social Services Dept for a 'needs assessment', who will come and advise what help they consider she needs. They won't provide lots of stuff if she can afford to pay for it herself, but it will give you a starting point as to what you need to be considering. Where I live it is called 'Adult Social Care' and usually contact numbers can be found on your Local Councils Website

My Mother had a cleaner/cum home help who was wonderful and would do all kinds of things to help my Mum - but she would also talk to me if she thought Mum needed this or that and would NEVER have taken it upon herself to just initiate any kind of spending etc.

It's difficult, I do understand, but sometimes you need to take control. My Mother did not have dementia per se - but she was in her 90's, our brains shrink as we get older and she no longer was able to make sensible decisions, because she wasn't able to. I was very aware that as a POA it was her Money, and never wanted to say an outright 'no', but nevertheless I had sometimes to reason with her, quite hard, when she decided she wanted to do something that wasn't sensible, given her financial situation. It was getting to the point where I knew I was going to have go down the route of doing just that, very soon, when she passed.

I feel for you