Carers giving medication

[TheLazyPanda]

6 weeks ago, after years of refusing point blank to have any outside help, my parents (89 & 96) started having visiting care twice a day from a private company. One of the main needs/concerns was their medication because they had become very confused with it. The breakfast time carer gives them their morning tablets. We asked for the lunchtime carer to put their night time tablets in little pots that we provided (like hospitals use) and leave for them to take at bed time. This has been working fine until the company rang me yesterday and said they can't do this, it's against their medication policy because they can't leave tablets out for later. They said it's called "secondary dispensing" and I googled it and it is a Thing. They presented me with 2 solutions: 1) the family does it - not practical as my sister and I don't live locally; 2) they have an evening visit. This is mad, paying for another minimum half hour visit just to hand out some tablets. It increases the weekly cost by 50% (they are fully self funding). My parents can't be left to do it themselves because my mum's arthritic fingers can't handle the boxes and my dad tends to mess them up. Has anyone encountered anything like this and found another solution? Thanks

Can’t they have their main meal early evening, that would solve your issue. I know they have had hot lunch until now but if you don’t want to pay for a third visit this is the obvious solution. Could lunch in the form of soup or stew be left in a flask from the morning if they can’t operate a microwave

If you don’t want to pay for another visit, swapping the main meal to the evening with the care visit seems the most obvious solution. Or potentially getting another company to do a 15min visit in the evening. Good luck, changes are always hard to navigate on this journey.

When my mum started to struggle with remembering to take her pills, and refused to have careers, the GP arranged for the District Nurse to call to give her medication to her. She had visits every morning and evening for several years, but I know not many authorities provide that service now.

Yes they are. We got as far as a telephone assessment (talking to me) with Adult Services but a F:F assessment was going to be weeks away and the need had become urgent for various reasons. They have to pay anyway so we went private.

Our care company suggested a pill dispenser (as previous posters have suggested) that had an alarm when the pills were due. The alarm continues if the door is not closed - so if you and your sister rang in the evening you’d know whether they’d taken them.

But seriously, I’d have a sandwich left out for lunchtime and have a visit/hot meal in the evening. It means they’re not left alone for hours- if something happened, you’d find out sooner. And it solves the tablet issue.

Our care company would only do 1hr visits. In the end I ditched them and took over everything myself as they couldn’t actually cover much we needed.

OP- Its confusing when you aren't quoting the person you are replying to. If you look at the message, there is a 'Quote' option on the left, bottom of each post. Press that, if you are replying that, specific message.

That will then show the message you are actually replying to and make it easier for us to follow what you are saying and to whom.

Oh well, I am in the North East and it’s a thing, and can only be referred in to by the GP.

Thanks for the suggestion but unfortunately they'd never agree to a sandwich for lunch and main meal in the evening, having done the opposite all their lives.

Well you'll have to be less of a Lazy Panda who won't quote and pay for an evening visit then!

Well then they'll have to pay what it costs to be that intransigent ie an extra carer visit. We can't always have what we want

3 visits a day it is then.

District Nurses in my Trust cancel around 70 calls a day due to capacity, they stopped taking on medication prompting many years ago and will only do insulin injections now. OP you have no choice but to have 3 calls then if they won't budge on the lunch issue.

@ScrewedByFunding Unkind and rude. My username was prompted by Mumsnet and I just accepted it. We (well, they) are already now paying for the extra evening visit. Thanks for upsetting me and spoiling my morning 😥

@redphonecase Unkind. We (well, they) are already now paying for the extra evening visit. Elderly people often do become intransigent. This is a whole new world for me and I was looking for help on here, not criticism 😥

Thanks for the replies and all the constructive suggestions. I'm sorry if my responses didn't join up with your comments, I didn't understand how to do it. I'm now going to turn off commenting if I can figure out how, because some of the latest comments have really upset me and that's not what I needed. I came here looking for help and now I'm starting my day in tears and feeling more despairing than ever.

Sorry you feel upset.

On the whole people are only trying to help, so try not to be upset.

You can't 'turn comments off' on MN, though you can ask for the thread to be deleted and MN may agree.

It does sound sadly as though your options are
. Care home
. Extra visit
. Accept that pills may get missed/muddled.

I hope you find a way through.

@TheLazyPanda I hope some of the comments on here have helped. It is a shame that so many people seem to want to argue with you as you struggle to do the very bast you can in a difficult situation. From my reading of this you are a caring person who simply needed some helpful advice.

My sister has to have carers come in each day due to a stroke at a young age.

She has three, one hour visits...

• morning, shower, medications, breakfast
• lunch and laundry.
• light evening meal, bed time routine and medications.

She also has a weekly cleaner and frozen Meals on Wheels delivered fortnightly and served by carer.
She has a driver to regular apppointments.
She has an electronic safety care alarm that she wears for if she falls etc.
Family visit once a week on planned days sometimes coinciding with appointments.

Wow, that was unnecessarily unpleasant and rude.

Whatever the reason for your apparent foul mood, there's no need to take it out on others, let alone someone asking for help.

Some people are just rude and unpleasant, don't let them bother you. Maybe it sounded like you didn't think they should pay for an evening visit and the card company were not being fair but they can't leave tablets out especially when they know the clients are confused about medication. Are they claiming attendance allowance, self funders can get financial help if they have an assessment. Sounds like it's sorted now but long term they will need a higher level of care so that might be something you all need to consider.

It wasn't criticism, just an explanation of the realities of life. But I still think worth checking with the GP if those meds have to be in the evening. eg we give statins routinely in the evening but they can be moved to the morning.

@redphonecase thanks. Everything that can be moved to the morning has. Mum takes 2 tablets in the evening that can't be taken earlier because they make her drowsy, and her GP and pharmacist have said that could be a fall risk.