Relocating NHS care during treatment?

[Richtea67]

Hi, has anyone any experience of supporting an elderly parent to relocate closer to them and relocating their nhs medical treatment? My mum is struggling and considering moving to be closer to us. She's in London currently. She has a number of long term health conditions requiring regular appointments/treatment. How easy is this to organise so there is no gap in treatment? TIA.

Hopeful bump

Do you mean hospital appointments or GP appointments?

It really depends what the treatments are.

Urgent things like cancer - one centre will refer to another

Lots of other stuff will be new referrals and go to the bottom of the queue

Yes one thing is cancer treatment, the other monthly eye injections to treat wet macular degeneration. She has other stuff going on....on waiting list for knee replacements, regular reviews for copd....

Cancer treatment - ask the specialist
Same for macular degeneration

Waiting list for knees - forget it, will be bottom of the queue again
Reviews for COPD - mainly done by surgery, new surgery will decide if hospital needed

It's a mixed bag really.

Our change of area was very unplanned and we did get some help from the regular clinics DF attended but honestly @AnnaMagnani has it right - it was back of the queue and constant phone calls chasing stuff up.

Can I ask was that back of the queue for urgent treatments, or routine things? I can just imagine it being a bit of a nightmare and lots of chasing!

Urgent was okayish - DF had twice weekly essential appointments (wound care) that were sorted by specialist clinic nurses who had treated DF for years being proactive with new area (can’t thank them enough).

Routine was harder - clinics under-resourced in both old and new areas meant starting again with explaining to GP, re-referrals made but on waiting lists for months. District nurses helped a little to nudge one on as they were at the coal face and could see the need.

Eye treatments have seemed joined up (I think private companies provide some services under contract to NHS, so they’re more proactive about booking appointments).

Hospitals and GPs don’t all seem to use the same systems or trust each other so although we were told records were handed over, things like scans seemed to need to be redone.

I’m sure it would be better with planning - we were rushed and there were bank holidays. Possibly ask GP to write a letter to new GP, summarise medicines and conditions, as well as consultant etc. Possibly consider requesting a copy of hospital records so you have them. Wishing you all the luck.