Dementia as a marketing ploy – abuse or not?

What would  you do if you became aware that someone who claims to have a diagnosis of dementia is being used and abused by a ‘company’ that claims to be involved in the care industry?

That someone may well have mental health and other issues to deal with, and without wishing to disrespect them at all, they are well aware that they are being used.

That someone knows exactly what is going on but they are unwilling to listen to any advice or comment that comes their way.  It’s not in their own best interests to do so.

However, it is in the best interests of  their own quest for fame and glory.  So they are unlikely to question the advances that have been made to them, all in the very best marketing interests of a ‘company’ that has absolutely no previous history (apart from a few failed attempts), no track record, that changes its website almost daily to reflect its latest ‘acceptable face’, but still a ‘company’ that has absolutely nothing to do with the care industry.  In spite of the way it allows itself to be described.  In fact, it describes almost every aspect of itself on its website incorrectly, misleadingly and with abominable cunning.

A ‘company’, that is, that has absolutely no right to use the word ‘care’ in its online description of itself, let alone to encourage vulnerable people to support their misleading claims and to perpetuate the misleading descriptions of itself.  Globally now!!!!  A ‘company’ that loves the word ‘global’ and encourages its prey to use the same word.

A ‘company’ that made the first and every subsequent approach to the vulnerable adult and managed to persuade him to go along with their plan.   All in the best marketing interests of the ‘company’ trying to devise a present and a future for itself, and also in the best interests of a vulnerable adult who cannot resist attention, flattery and support in his quest for fame.

A ‘company’ that fails, time and time again, to correct any of the information being circulated by their found prey.

A ‘company’ that encourages the vulnerable adult to continue to promote it, albeit via incorrect information sources.  All that information remains uncorrected by the vulture.

What would you do, in the face of such vicious abuse of a vulnerable adult who may – or may not – be living with a diagnosis of dementia?

All replies will be received with thanks, and will be considered in depth,

Care UK regrets they weren’t able to care for you, madam

With apologies and thanks to Cole Porter and Ella Fitzgerald, two of your favourites.

Care UK regrets they weren’t able to care for you, madam.

Care UK regrets they weren’t able to care for you.

They can’t even apologise.

Best they can do is  just general regret, madam.

Care UK regrets they weren’t able to care for you.

“Care UK strives to provide appropriate care for all their residents across the various services that they run.”  Allegedly.

“It is always a matter of regret if a service is not provided as they would wish.”   Allegedly.

Apparently I “clearly consider that there were failings in the care provided” to you.  I most certainly do, and I’m not alone in that opinion.

Care UK’s solicitor has been asked “to pass on their regret in respect of this”.

Care UK has been made aware of the fact that Catherine Igbokwe and Sheila Ali have both been struck off the register by the NMC (Nursing and Midwifery Council) for misconduct and for failing you miserably, and that Maria Rholyn Secuya (nee Baquerfo) has received a 3 year caution order for misconduct and for failing you miserably, and that Dahlia Dela Cerna (nee Enriquez) has received a 2 year caution order for misconduct and for failing you miserably.

Care UK can only  come up with an expression of general regret, via a third party at that.  General regret is overworked these days.

Care UK promised to provide a substantial sum in your memory, acknowledging that it failed miserably to provide care to you, and so that we would be able to establish what Care UK’s then Managing Director of Residential Care called “a positive contribution to the world of dementia”. In your memory.   Care UK has now broken that promise.  How foolish we were to place our trust in Care UK.

Care Circus is back in town next week

Well, here we go again.

Next week the Care Circus is back in town.

The latest batch of NMC hearings is about to stir its loins again and get on with the work that it was charged with handling long ago on 1 October 2008.  That was only a few very short months after you died, thanks to the rubbish care that came your way, courtesy of Care UK and Lennox House so-called care home in Islington, London.

It was also a few very short months after I’d asked so many questions of Islington’s Mental Health Care of Older People team, and then Islington’s Social Services, and then the CQC (or CSCI as it was called back at the beginning of 2008), and the Coroner’s Office, and Islington’s Safeguarding of Vulnerable Adults Team, and  most of all of Care UK … well, you will know how many questions I asked of them all, each and every one of them.

They don’t like answering questions, do they?  Especially if those demanding but necessary questions are likely to cast a very dim and dark shadow over their (lack of) accomplishments.

Last December 2012, the NMC decided that one nurse involved in your demise should be struck off, from their register of nurses allowed to nurse in the UK.  Another nurse was delivered a 3 year caution order, requiring her to be on her best behaviour.

Next week, 15 to 19 April 2013,  the Circus is back in town.  Fifteen months after the NMC hearings first started, looking in depth at the circumstances surrounding your rapid decline, within 10 days of arrival in that so-called care home, Lennox House, and your admission to hospital in a diabetic coma.  You died 3 weeks later.

The  final 2 cases, still waiting in the wings, are to be dealt with by the NMC next week.

One case  is that of the care home manager, who is mid-way through an interim 9 months suspension order, placed to allow time for her to seek permission for a Judicial Review in the High Court, of the NMC decisions thus far.  The High Court refused permission to seek a Judicial Review.

The clowns will all be wearing their costumes.  Their faces will all be heavily disguised beneath the cake of their make-up.  They will all have their props to support them.  Their scripts will all have been written, re-written and then written again.  Edited, heavily edited, and then edited again.

You weren’t allowed to write a script of  your own, were you?  Let alone edit it.

The script of your final years, months and weeks of your life was snatched from you.  Grabbed by thugs.  The uncaring, unqualified, untrained, unmonitored, unsupervised, unsuitable thugs who were charged with the most basic and fairly simple duty of looking after you.

Next week, they will still be wearing their masks, their costumes  and their heavy make-up.

As they will continue to do year after year.  Uncaring as always.  Unkind in their presentation thus far.  Unwilling to admit that they failed miserably in their duty of care to you, for you and about you.  They didn’t care enough to care.

The chance to wear your dresses, your gentle make-up and to present your smiling face to the world was taken from you.  By the thugs of care.  The thieves of care.  The robbers of care.

Alzheimer’s Society and the Horse fraternity

Over recent months or even years, many people have become irritated, bemused, frustrated, confused and perplexed by the Alzheimer’s Society’s online chat room also known as Talking Point.  Posts have been dumbed down and members dumbfounded by many of the decisions made by the appointed representatives of the Alzheimer’s Society, working and operating its online forum.

Many people were hoping that things had changed, once the Alzheimer’s Society had rid itself of what it perceived to be irritating members who were brave enough to challenge the Administrative nonsense going on.  Similar to the way that Julie  Bailey and ‘Cure the NHS’ have challenged the brick walls of care, resulting at long last in the Francis Report.

It is so easy for the Alz Soc to ban forum members who challenged the ignorant actions of its Administrators and Moderators.  The Alz Soc compromised many members by editing and/or deleting their posts, even if they only referred to Winterbourne View, or … wait for it …. the British Geriatric Society, or even Peter Carter of the RCN.  All mentions were obliterated without being able to be questioned by the members.   Members who posted about BSE or CJD and dementia-linked situations were also deleted and obliterated.

It was all too uncomfortable for the Alzheimer’s Society to contemplate such matters.

It is far too comfortable for the Alzheimer’s Society to silence those members who had the guts to challenge matters.

It makes  me wonder how the Alz Soc will react if/when the latest horse-meat scandal comes to evidence a connection between dementia and the introduction into the human food supply of a drug called Phenylbutazone – a drug that is now only used in the care of horses but which was  previously used in the care of human beings who also happened to have arthritic/rheumatic joint problems.  The experimental use of Phenylbutazone in humans was disastrous and resulted in death, and it also resulted in Phenylbutazone being banned for use in human beings suffering from arthritis/rheumatism.  That was circa 1975, so it’s possible that any use of Phenylbutazone now in human beings is heavily restricted, controlled and monitored.  I hope so.

The Alz Soc shed the skin of those that it felt irritated by, namely those who posted examples of sub-standard care.  All mention of Winterbourne View was eradicated from the forum, as were posts mentioning Southern Cross, to name but a few.

Almost overnight, it became acceptable for people to name Stafford Hospital, to call social services ‘social circuses’, to talk of ‘lies and more lies’ when referring to social care systems that the posters had come by.  Even mention of MPs was suddenly allowed, whereas previous posts mentioning similar had been edited and/or deleted.  So members were thinking that things may be changing and on the up.

The forum Administrators and Moderators prod and poke and provoke.  Until such time as the Alzheimers’s Society’s appointed Administrators and Moderators can ban thinking members.  It’s so much more comfortable for the Alz Soc to leave its own comfort zone untouched and unsullied by those Members of the Alz Soc who would like questions to be answered.

The latest example goes beyond the acceptable when it comes to caring about dementia.  [I choose not to use the word Alzheimer’s because it denies recognition of all other forms of dementia.  It also sweeps away most of the important factor that people living in the UK care about at present.]

It is all swept away by someone who has no idea what it means to be trying to achieve quality care in the UK.

Here, the Alzheimer’s Society’s online Talking Point forum:

“While this may be your view, that’s all it is – your view. Some care homes may be like this, some are not. To state that all of anything is untrustworthy is inappropriate in my view.”

Is that the view of the Alzheimer’s Society?  Is it the view of an appointed Alzheimer’s Society person?  Is that the point of view of someone who has not one single clue about what it means to be living in the UK with dementia and caring about those who are living in the UK with dementia, let alone those who are living in the UK and still dealing with the care home system that is so sadly lacking in quality and standards of care.

It is the point of view of someone – an online forum Moderator,  appointed by the Alzheimer’s Society –  who has never had any direct experience of the care home system in the UK, who has never had any experience of social services in the UK, who has never had any dealings with that which most people are dealing with when it comes to care in the UK.

But someone who  is still given full reign to spout about that which affects every single person living in the UK.

A virtual Queen of the World.

Care in the UK over two weeks in December 2012

1 December 2012: TENS of thousands of vulnerable people are being physically and mentally abused by the very people meant to be caring for them. Disturbing figures reveal that 130,000 adults were ill treated – usually at the hands of carers or family. Abuse most often took place in their own home or care home.  Read more here.

1 December 2012: Abuse of elderly patients by NHS staff rises by a third in one year with a  shocking 36,000 offences reported last year alone.  Read more here.

1 December 2012: Care home regulation criticised by Norman Lamb.  Regulation of the care sector is not fit for purpose, care minister Norman Lamb has said as he unveiled proposals on English care homes for consultation. He also said there was a “significant lack of corporate accountability for the quality of care”. One suggested measure involves companies having to open up their books to inspectors to ensure they are financially sound. Read more here.

1 December 2012: Care home companies could be forced to open books to prevent another ‘Southern Cross’ collapse.  Read more here.

4 December 2012: Care home job advertisements ‘encouraging’ criminals to apply.  Convicted criminals have been encouraged to apply for jobs in care homes looking after frail, elderly people.  Read more here.

4 December 2012: Ann Clwyd, Labour MP tells of inhumane treatment and says she fears normalisation of cruelty now rife among NHS nurses.  Ann Clwyd has said her biggest regret is that she didn’t “stand in the hospital corridor and scream” in protest at the “almost callous lack of care” with which nurses treated her husband as he lay dying in the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff.  Read more here.

4 December 2012: Melton Court care home to be closed by Friday. The manager of a South Yorkshire care home, which has been ordered to close by Friday, says she is in talks with two potential new providers. The 21 residents at Melton Court in Maltby have to find new homes, after it emerged the owner is in prison. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) revoked Ishtiaq Zahir’s licence and said the home is operating illegally.  Read more here.

5 December 2012: A PENSIONER with Alzheimer’s died after she plunged down a lift shaft when the door was left unsecured, a court heard yesterday. Annfield Plain company faces health and safety charges after tragedy.   Read more here.

5 December 2012: Wrexham – Concerns over care at mental health hospital.  Read more here.

6 December 2012: Leicester – Dementia sufferer ‘left in agony’ at George Hythe House care home in Beaumont Leys, court hears.  An 89-year-old dementia sufferer was left in agony for four hours with a broken thigh  because a care home supervisor could not be bothered to assess her, a   jury heard. Sarah Bewley was “too busy” doing paperwork to see the woman after she suffered a fall, despite several requests from a care assistant, it was claimed.  Read more here.  See below.

7 December 2012: Regulator moves closer to setting up ‘negative register’ of adult care staff.   If the proposals are approved by government, a national code of conduct would be applied to workforce and the HCPC would consider serious complaints made about individual professionals; any decisions to uphold a complaint would be made public, as would the resulting sanction.

A “negative register” would be maintained of those found unfit to practise.  Read more here.

7 December 2012:  Leicester – Jury clears Leicester care home boss of neglect charge.  After the not guilty verdict was announced, Judge Lynn Tayton QC said: “This case raises very worrying issues, particularly concerning systems that seemed to be in place which created a situation in which no-one took responsibility for the care of this lady.  “She was left in severe and unnecessary pain for a number of hours.”I hope those in charge of the home have looked at the systems and the staff training.” Read more here.

7 December 2012:   Chorley, Lancs – A care-home worker and her husband who subjected  their children to years of horrific abuse were facing jail yesterday after being  convicted of cruelty.  Read more here.

8 December 2012: Wolverhampton – An investigation has been launched into safeguarding at a care home, which helps people with mental health, drugs and alcohol problems.  Read more here.

8 December 2012: Derby – A national health watchdog has issued a damning report on a privately-run Derby care home.  The Care Quality Commission has told the company  that owns Cleeve Villas Nursing Home, in Wilson Street, to do more to protect the safety and welfare of residents – or face legal action.  Among the problems identified were:

• No organised stock control system of medicines
• Failure of staff to update crucial medical documents
• Care plans reviews not completed on time
• Failure to ensure prescribed medicines were always available
• Medicine doses not being documented, meaning it was unclear whether medications had been administered
• No appropriate systems in place for the safe disposal of medicines when they were no longer required.

Read more here.

Read the CQC report on Cleeve Villas here.

That list of failures is just the kind of thing most people don’t know about, so  awareness raised to the top is what we need in the world of care.

When it comes to the comment made by the spokeswoman for Cleeve Villas Care Services : “As a dedicated provider of care services, we at Cleeve Villas have taken on board the suggestions from CQC as to how to enhance our overall performance and have already taken steps working with a specialist healthcare consultancy to address these.”Our aim as always is to ensure the individual and complex needs of our residents are met.”

I don’t believe you.  Yet.  This is not the first CQC detailing same/similar problems.   What has taken you so long to show that you care enough to provide good quality care?

9 December 2012: Vulnerable care home residents are treated like “brutes or malfunctioning machines”, said Hilary Mantel, the author, as she spoke of the “utterly depressing” search to find accommodation for a disabled friend.  Read more here.

10 December 2012:  We haven’t a clue how much a care home will cost us.  The vexed question of how we pay for the care needs of Britain’s ageing population rears its ugly head so often that it is no wonder everyone thinks it is a pain in the neck.  Read more here.

10 December 2012: Star ratings: Families need reliable information on care home performance.  Read more here.

10 December 2012: Preventative care for elderly under threat.  Services have been cut or frozen by two-thirds of local councils since coalition came to power, according to ComRes study.  Read more here.

10 December 2012: A Birmingham care home is being investigated by council and health bosses amid  allegations of neglect.  Bramley Court Care Home, in School Road, Yardley Wood, is facing the probe  after a complaint was made about the standard of care given to elderly  residents. New admissions have been suspended while a joint investigation is carried out  by the city council and NHS Birmingham and Solihull.  It is not the first time the home has been in the spotlight over its  treatment of residents. In August a report by watchdog, the Care Quality Commission, found residents  were being put at risk of not receiving adequate food and drink.  Read more here.

10 December 2012: Winterbourne View scandal prompts new care guidelinesReport warns that care sector risks slipping back into institutional culture typified by Victorian asylum system.

The report warns that, elsewhere, staffing cuts caused by reduced fees paid to care providers are causing residents to be left alone for hours at a time and are fostering excessive reliance on use of drugs and on physical restraint, “often for minor perceived misdemeanours”.

Brendan Sarsfield, Family Mosaic’s chief executive, said: “We would argue that if providers don’t believe this has ever happened in their services, it just may be that they haven’t looked hard enough.  Read more here.

10 December 2012: Care home provider Family Mosaic has warned that the care sector is in danger of slipping back into the institutional ways of the past and is urging care providers “not to be complacent” and be vigilant for danger signs of abuse.  Read more here.

10 December 2012: Winterbourne View scandal: Government rethinks use of hospitals.  Norman Lamb said “”We need to have a situation where people who run care organisations – public or private sector or voluntary – know that they are accountable for the services they provide and there are consequences if they don’t.”  You can’t argue with that so let’s home he brings about accountability.  Read more here.

12 December 2012: Copthorne, Sussex – Care home boss suspended over death of patient.  A care home manager has been suspended by the Nursing and Midwifery Council over allegations she shredded a document to cover up a mistake which led to the death of a resident. The resident of  Orchid View care home in Copthorne was given three times the prescribed dosage of Warfarin, a drug used to prevent blood clots, over 17 days in 2010. Read more here.

12 December 2012: Stockton care home boss denies a catalogue of failures.  Meal times at the home were “appallingly organised” and 15 out of 17 patients  lost weight over a one-month period, the Nursing and Midwifery Council heard.  Read more here.

12 December 2012: York care home warned to make urgent improvements.  The Care Quality Commission has issued a formal warning to Mimosa Healthcare (No 4) Limited, which is the registered provider of Birchlands Care Home, that they are failing to protect the safety and welfare of the people using the service.  Read more here.

12 December 2012: Wall Heath care home told to shape up or face enforcement action.  The Care Quality Commision (CQC) is demanding an improvement in the standards of care at Holbeche House after inspectors found failings during an unannounced visit in October.  The Wolverhampton Road home, which is run by Four Seasons (Bamford) Limited, was found to be below standards for the care and welfare of service users and assessing and monitoring the quality of services.  Andrea Gordon, deputy director of operations (central region) for CQC, said: “The law says these are the standards that everyone should be able to expect. Providers have a duty to ensure they are compliant.  Read more here.

12 December 2012: Nurse at Rodborough care home slept with vulnerable female patient and invited another to swingers’ parties. Trevor Rice, a senior triage mental health nurse at Park House Mental Health Resource Centre, was formally removed from his post by a Nursing and Midwifery Council disciplinary committee on November 23.   Read more here.

12 December 2012: A bungling nurse who was cleared to work in Sussex despite making a number of shocking errors is being investigated for a second time.   Nicanor Sindanum made national headlines after he was allowed to continue to work as a nurse despite being found guilty of 17 serious errors by a nursing panel while working in Scotland.   In June this year a nine-month banning order imposed by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) in September 2011 was revoked and replaced with conditions of practice order.  This meant that, despite his failings, Sindanum was allowed to start work for an Eastbourne care home so long as he told bosses that he had restrictions placed on him. But now it has emerged that Sindanum faces a second investigation for alleged failings dating from 2009.  Read more here.

13 December 2012: Slyne-with-Hest, Lancashire – Four people have been charged with offences under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 following a police investigation into the mistreatment of residents at a care home in Slyne.  Read more here.

13 December 2012: Wales – More should be done to reduce Wales’ reliance on using care homes as a way to look after older people, says a group of Assembly Members.  The assembly’s health committee has backed moves to help people keep their independence for as long as possible. Families need simple and accessible information about the options available for elderly relatives, it said. It pointed out that many elderly people who pay for their own care were unaware of the help available to them.  Read more here.

13 December 202: Panshanger, Welwyn, Herts -Massive arrogance’ jibe as ‘out of scale’ care home plans thrown out.  Read more here.

13 December 2012: Morpeth, Northumberland – Coroner hits out at care of woman in Morpeth home.  Mr Brown, recording a narrative verdict, yesterday concluded the fall “did  play a part” in Mrs McEwan’s death as the fractured femur caused immobility  which made her more susceptible to the fatal complaint. The coroner also found three serious failures in the care of Mrs McEwan.

He ruled senior carer Stephanie Wilson had left Mrs McEwan’s bed in an  elevated position, moments before she fell while trying to get into it.

Furthermore, Mr Brown said staff had failed by phoning a doctor’s surgery  instead of an ambulance after the fall, even though Mrs McEwan was in obvious  pain and in need of such care immediately.

Finally, the coroner said workers had been wrong to lift Mrs McEwan back on  the bed, saying they should have left her where she was comfortable until the  ambulance arrived.

Mr Brown nevertheless accepted that staff had been misguided and in need of  better training rather than motivated by malice.  Read more here.

13 December 2012: Croydon  – Are Croydon care homes up to the job of looking after borough’s most vulnerable?  Nearly a third of care homes in the south of the borough are failing patients and residents in one or more key standard, an Advertiser investigation has found.

Campaigners for better care say the findings paint a “dire” picture for sick and elderly people at a time when savings in care provision are set to be enforced.

Among those that are failing in one or more key standard are homes which charge elderly people up to £800 a week.

Stuart Routledge, chief executive of Age UK Croydon, said: “It is appalling that any nursing home should fail to protect the dignity and respect of their patients and residents.

“This survey underpins the urgency for social care funding reform so that those older people who struggle daily with chronic ill health, frailty and disability have the peace of mind that they will be well cared for at their time of need.

“In particular, this shows the dire consequences of a social care system that has been under increasing financial pressure over the last eight years and in many areas is now financially stripped to the bone.

“Staff across health and care services have a professional and moral duty to make sure the dignity of their patients and residents is enshrined in every action. This means involving people in decisions about their care, providing care that treats people with respect and helping people to be as independent possible.”

Read more here.

The Alzheimer’s Society – Sick Joke?

In March 2011, I wrote here of Private Eye’s  disturbing piece about the way in which the Alzheimer’s Society had closed down 240 regional branch committees, merging them into large regional centres, and then apparently seizing control of all the funds in those branches, and also branch property.  (No. 1284; 18 March 2011 – 31 March 2011; page 30.)  The Alzheimer’s Society didn’t care enough to reply to Private Eye’ article Fund razing, as far as I can see.

The Alzheimer’s Society funds, operates and manages an “online support and discussion forum, for anyone affected by dementia. It’s a place to ask for advice, share information, join in discussions and feel supported.”  Allegedly.  The forum is currently sponsored by Santander, with Tesco somewhere in the background, plus a few other sources of funding.  Probably Bupa, and many other care providers.

There was quite some discussion here on the Alzheimer’s Society forum about the closure of local branch committees and seizing of funds from local branches.  168 postings in total, so a fairly lengthy thread on the forum, with many questions being asked but many soft-fudge replies being given by the Alzheimer’s Society.  Then, before you could blink, the thread was locked, closed to further comment, because long-serving and loyal members of Talking Point – the name given to the so-called ‘support and discussion forum’ – were not happy about the platitudes being dished out to them by the Alzheimer’s Society.  They were confused, upset, fed up and disgruntled.   Many of them no longer support the Alzheimer’s Society or post on Talking Point.

A few weeks later, Private Eye (No. 1289; 27 May – 9 June 2011; page 30) reported that even more volunteers were being driven away from the Charity, with new breakaway groups emerging.  One group apparently wrote to the Alzheimer’s Society complaining that it was “utterly unacceptable and unforgiveable to write in such disdainfully bureacratic terms to anyone, let alone a group of women who have given so much of their time, energy and devotion to the very society you represent”.  Alun Parry-Jones, a former Alzheimer’s Society committee member was the chair of that breakaway group.  He also said “the society should be ashamed of driving out ‘the expertise and dedication of this group of stalwarts’.”   That piece was published in Private Eye under the banner Voluntary redundancy.

Again, the Alzheimer’s Society didn’t care enough to comment.

Now, Private Eye features a piece on the £2.4m given to the Alzheimer’s Society to train one million ‘dementia friends’.  The Eye (No. 1328; 30 November – 12 December 2012; page 30) headlines its piece with the words Sick joke.  Ernie Thompson, who started the old Sunderland branch in 1987, said “That the Society is now being paid to find new volunteers as dementia friends looks to me like a sick joke.  It was what we had been doing for years – only to be summarily dismissed”.

I wonder whether the Alzheimer’s Society will care enough to comment on that one.

It appears that the Alzheimer’s Society neither supports nor wants freedom of thought and actions where dementia is concerned.  It only supports freedoms that the Alzheimer’s Society finds acceptable.  The Alzheimer’s Society is strangling its members.  There is now even an unbelievable attempt to control the way people write their posts on its Talking Point forum.  Posts are edited behind the scenes without prior discussion with the writer of the posts, and often leaving no visible trace of the reasons for editing; words are changed or removed from posts without discussion; mention of moderators’ actions is not allowed; people are gagged when they dare attempt genuine discussion.

Salaried employees of the Alzheimer’s Society are paid to delete all mention of tragedies such as Winterbourne View.  Every single mention of Winterbourne View has been edited out – and there were many.  The words “Winterbourne View” no longer appear on any post on that forum.  The disgust felt by reasonable people when the tragedy of Winterbourne View became known has been the catalyst for potentially huge improvements in the way care is provided to vulnerable people.  But it never happened, as far as the Alzheimer’s Society’s online support forum is concerned.  Terry Bryan would be more than upset, I fear, and rightly so.

Censorship has deleted Winterbourne View.  Alongside many other things deleted by the Alzheimer’s Society.

Is that another Sick joke on the part of the Alzheimer’s Society?

Another personal message to The Horse

It’s strange to see you keep returning to my Blog. You have not the slightest interest in the content, in me or in the background to my Blog. I can only imagine what you’re hoping to find.  When you first started stalking me here, you wondered whether you should be concerned.  They were your words – not mine.

I’m not the only person you’re stalking.  You are becoming a bully.  A bully with a need to control every single thing in its path, from the individual words people choose to use to the wider way they choose to express themselves.  You work hard to entice ponies resembling sheep into your stable, so your stud is now somewhat mixed, sad and confused.  You are rude, patronising and arrogant.  You are brutal.  You are a dictator.  That is dangerous.

Treatment is available for mental health problems.  Perhaps you are in the wrong place; the place you spend your every waking hour is adding to your problems.  You can’t even see that people are laughing at you now; they are not laughing with you.

Stalking is a specific criminal offence in the UK.

“Greater Manchester Police Assistant Chief Constable Garry Shewan, who leads on stalking and harassment for the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), said the law change would make it easier for victims to go to the police.”  “Stalking was previously dealt with under harassment laws introduced in 1997. He said the field had changed, including the emergence of cyber-stalking, and it was right the law was adapted to ‘plug any gaps’.”  Read more here. 

You should take great care to retreat into the background, rather than keeping your own ego puffed up by belittling people.  You have the power of position that allows you to be as sarcastic and rude to people as you wish.  Your position allows you to humiliate people.  They have no chance of returning your criticism, not even in a more polite way than your own method.

You think you are beyond reproach, because you hold the whip in your hand.

You are the self-appointed judge, jury, prison officer, executioner.

You hold the keys to the cells and you use them whenever it is in your own best interests.

How sad is that?

Shame on you.  Yes, you should be concerned.

Neglect and abuse in care in the UK in November 2012

Some people try to convince me that cases of neglect and abuse of vulnerable people in care in the UK are extremely rare.  Some people also try to convince me that those who talk of such cases are scaremongering.

Below is just a selection of cases of neglect and abuse of vulnerable people in care in the UK over the month of November 2012.  It is a selection and by no means all of the cases I came across.  The dates are the publication dates.

5 November 2012:   Britain’s biggest care home owners ‘have £5 billion debts’.      Read more here.

5 November 2012: Nottingham – Police are investigating an elderly care home in Nottingham which closed after  having its council contract suspended.  Read more here.

6 November 2012: Suffolk – The great care home giveaway: Tory council calls in the private sector.   Suffolk County Council has agreed a multimillion pound deal with the private sector to take over its care homes amid fresh calls for financial regulation to protect elderly residents and the taxpayer.

The council’s 16 aging homes will be closed by 2015 and 10 new homes (and wellbeing centres) built – giving the county 104 extra beds to help meet growing demand.

The first five will be built and owned by Schroders UK Property Fund – who will lease the homes back to Care UK. The land is being given to Schroders for free by the council with unrestricted freeholds.   Read more here.

9 November 2012: Dementia patient found wandering in the freezing night ten miles from home after carer ‘forgot’ about him – Read more here.

9 November 2012: – Devon -Council breached equality duty in setting care home fees.  Authority to review care home fees after High Court found it failed to consider impact of possible home closures on vulnerable residents.  Read more here.

19 November 2012: Hayling Island – three women arrested as police investigate claims of neglect at a care home – Read more here.

19 November 2012: Olney, Northamptonshire – two women charged in connection with neglect at a residential home – Read more here.

19 November 2012: Luton – woman denies neglect after an elderly woman with dementia was left on a bus in Luton overnight – Read more here.

19 November 2012: St Saviour, Jersey – A care home nurse threatened to teach a  colleague a lesson by beating her up ‘in the African way’ during an aggressive  outburst, a tribunal heard. Read more here.

20 November 2012: Buckinghamshire – two care home workers charged with neglecting patients at care home for dementia sufferers – each charged with 19 counts  of wilfully neglecting a person without capacity between August 18 and 19, 2011 – Read more here.

23 November 2012: Archway, London – Whittington Hospital – two senior nurses ignored plight of epileptic 17 year old who suffered 5 epileptic fits in the space of 24 hours and died four days later – Read more here.

26 November 2012: Swindon, Wiltshire – Selena House Care Home, Stratton St Margaret to close in December “over safety fears” – The CQC report said the home had failed to meet 11 government standards,  including care and welfare, dignity, cleanliness and infection control. Read more here.

27 November 2012: Goole, Yorkshire – Three Women Arrested after elderly woman is injured ‘while unattended’, allegedly, in care home . Read more here.

27 November 2012: Chingford, Essex – Chingford rehab unit so understaffed patients were left to wet the bed, watchdog finds.  Vulnerable patients’ dignity was compromised by poorly trained staff at a rehab unit where dementia was mistaken for a learning difficulty, according to a damning watchdog report. Read more here.

27 November 2012: Cambridgeshire – Abacus Care Cambridgeshire  has been issued with a formal warning by a health watchdog after failing to meet standards for a second time. Read more here.

27 November 2012: Great Wyrley, Staffs –  care home worker stole cash and personal belongings from residents and staff to help fund her drug habit.  Read more here.

28 November 2012: What can be done to ensure care home residents get quality healthcare? Reports suggest the availability of doctors in care homes has fallen short of what residents are entitled to. So what can be done to ensure these patients get the care they deserve?  Read more here.

30 November 2012: Maltby, Sth Yorks – Melton Court care home residents face pre-Christmas move after it emerged the home’s owner is in prison serving a sentence for causing grievous bodily harm.  Read more here.

And finally, as December 2012 arrives we find:

1 December 2012: Care home regulation not fit for purpose, says care minister Norman Lamb.  Read more here.

Better late than never, I guess, but what took you so long to work that one out?

Nadine Dorries & her super-inflated ego

I haven’t been bothered to keep up with Nadine Dorries and her antics until now.  Partly because I don’t often watch that programme.

I’ve heard the rubbish that she has occasionally spouted, and I’ve read the rubbish she’s reported as having spouted.

All I can say is Get Her Out of Here.

She appears to me to be just another self-centred, fame-seeking, super-inflated egotistical mind-numbingly boring person who does not deserve to be supported by the Public Purse.

 

Social workers are revolting

Social workers are distraught about the portrayal of social work in Eastenders.  The storyline concerns young Lola, and her baby Lexi, who was removed from her mother’s care by a social worker.

1. Social workers outraged by EastEnders storyline about baby Lexi – more here
“The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) is engaged in a battle with the BBC over a storyline in EastEnders.

Last Friday, the TV soap featured a social worker removing a baby from a teenage mother, Lola, apparently without sufficient grounds to do so.

The BASW immediately condemned the plot. It accused BBC producers of being “too lazy and arrogant” to get their portrayal of the child protection process right.’

2. Fury over Eastenders’ ‘misleading’ social work storyline  – more here

‘An Eastenders plot line has sparked outrage among social workers who have criticised the BBC for misrepresenting their work and putting children at risk.’

I’m not quite sure how 5 minutes (approx)  in total of a fictional TV soap can be seen to be ‘putting children at risk’ but I’ll no doubt get the message eventually.

3. ‘Eastenders’ portrayal of social work left me in tears’  – more here
‘I am sure I am not the only one to feel aggrieved by last Friday’s Eastenders social work story line, not least because accurate procedures were not followed [when a character’s baby was taken away]. Was it police protection, section 20? Where was the immediate risk to the baby? As a social worker, I was in tears, as was a colleague of mine, watching how our profession was portrayed on television.

As a result, I sent a complaint to the BBC ….’

Stick with me – it gets worse.

4. The British Association of Social Workers: – more here
Eastenders demonising social workers – BASW leads fight back
‘BASW has sprung to the defence of the social work profession after being inundated by complaints from members about an EastEnders storyline involving care leaver Lola Pearce having her baby removed by an oppressive social worker Trish Barnes, played by Tessa Churchard.’
‘Commenting on the portrayal Bridget Robb, acting chief executive British Association of Social Workers said: “It is disgraceful to see a publicly funded broadcaster deliberately spreading misinformation about the child protection process because it is too lazy and arrogant to get it right. We regularly give advice to programmes about social work storylines; we would like to know who advised EastEnders so badly.” ‘

Having just watched the episode in question, I wish the social workers in my life had been as harmless as the Eastenders’ social worker character, but more importantly as ‘kind and caring’ as the BASW seems to think they all are in real life.

Eastenders is a soap. It is fiction! Remember,  nobody is suggesting that social workers are all ‘lazy and arrogant’ on occasion/sometimes/frequently/often, are they?  Yet, the BBC scriptwriters are lazy and arrogant, according to BASW.

The reaction from social workers and from the BASW has done more damage to their cause than did the Eastenders episodes.

“Eastenders’ shabby portrayal of an entire profession has made a tough job even tougher”, writes BASW acting Chief Executive.  Talk about over-egging the pudding.  This is a portrayal of one single fictional social worker – not an entire profession – in a TV soap.  It’s not a documentary.

“BASW is also urging all social workers to vote against Eastenders in the National TV Awards, unless the programme’s producers can demonstrate a proper understanding of why the portrayal has invited such concern among social workers.”  Is that a mature response to a problem, or is it a childish foot-stamping reaction?

BASW quotes a whole load of abusive Tweets about the Eastenders episode in question – without providing any evidence of the reasons for those tweets, or the background of ‘who’ tweeted ‘what’ – but if it’s in the best interests of BASW, that makes it OK, does it?  Not in my view.

Perhaps BASW doesn’t need evidence.

Perhaps BASW and social workers really are lazy and arrogant.

Perhaps BASW and social workers have memory problems – they seem to spout the same ‘excuses’ when it comes to criticism of their profession, even when that criticism comes from Judges.

As here  just a couple of years ago.   ‘Courts distrust evidence from social workers.  Judges delay decisions in urgent cases affecting vulnerable children to hear from other experts, says report.  Courts are refusing applications to take children into care because some members of the judiciary hold social workers in such low esteem that they do not trust their evidence, it will be claimed this week in a major study.’

If social workers and the BASW want a realistic portrayal of a social worker on TV, they might be more than horrified.  Their shiny self- image might be seriously tarnished.  I’d even volunteer to write an episode or three!

To all those social workers who have been reduced to tears by about 5 minutes in total (so far) of a fictional portrayal of social work, my message to you is that I would like you all to be reduced to tears as often as I’ve been by the real-life actions of social services.    

Arrogant and lazy in the extreme were the social workers in my life.  Manipulating and re-writing their ‘paperwork’, and doing so on the instructions of their Team Leader who instructed them to make sure it was ‘watertight’.   He accidentally sent me a copy of his internal email – and also of the massive legal advice he’d had to seek to allow him to validate (not!)  his despicable actions.  Making decisions about a mature person, vulnerable because of her dementia – decisions made totally against the Mental Capacity Act 2005, hence the need for the paperwork to be re-written and waterproofed, on the instruction of their Boss.

Making decisions in a ward round that had long-lasting and devastating consequences for my relative – even though they had been warned by me about the possible consequences of the abuse of their powers of social services.

I used the words “if you do that, she will die”.  I was right.  They were wrong.

It took me years to get an explanation and a half-hearted apology from the Team Leader who was no ‘new kid on the block’’  He’d been around the block many times by the time his destructive power entered my life.

Apology?  I use that word loosely, but it went along the lines of the fact that the Mental Capacity Act is enormously difficult to understand, even for (so-called) professionals.  It included words like ‘new to this’, and ‘challenged’ but ignoring important matters like failing to do the decent thing, failing to consult properly with family, making decisions and fabricating paperwork to match his despicable directives.

It’s taken me more than 5 years to deal with the consequences of those decisions too – and my ‘dealing’ with it all is still serious, still ongoing and yes, I’ve shed more than a few tears over those 5 years.

The social workers in my life, and in the life of my relative, all colluded and contributed to the serious decline and unkind death of one gentle harmless kind individual.  Such was their arrogance; so great was their intransigence; so incompetent were they all.

That’s what I call shabby, irresponsible, despicable social work.

I won’t be shedding a single tear over the fictional portrayal of one fictional  social worker in Eastenders.

The BASW and its many social workers shouldn’t be shedding tears either.  They should all grow up and act responsibly and honestly, rather than hide behind their tears.

Bet you all that one single droplet of my tears is far more genuine than your accumulated and congealed tears.