Some 5 months after the completion of the CHC checklist on discharge from hospital , referring my Mother for a full assessment, the "powers that be" have, at last, got round to carrying out the DST asessment. This took place at the care home where Mum has been for the past 12 months.
Present at the meeting were a member of the CHC team who had previously observed Mum for approx 30 mins, a psychiatric nurse who has never met Mum (nor asked to meet her), a senior carer from the home and myself and my brother.
After a 2 hour discussion going through all the domains, my mother scored 4 high, 4 moderate, 2 low and 2 none.
We were asked to leave the room whilst the team discussed the findings, were called back in after only a few minutes and were told Mum does not qualify for CHC funding.
Irrelevant of the fact that we recorded that we do not agree the scores in two areas (we, and the home, believe Behaviour to be "Priority" and Psychological to be "High"), when reading the DST guidelines "Establishing a Primary Health Need" paragraph 31, it states that "A clear recommendation of eligibility to NHS continuing healthcare would be expected where there is a number of domains with high and/or moderate needs".
As Mum scored 8 out of 12 domains with high and moderate we would have thought that she would fall into this category but we were told in no uncertain terms that we were not interpretting the guidelines correctly and the team's decision was correct.
Any advice, comments or experience of these matters much appreciated.
Present at the meeting were a member of the CHC team who had previously observed Mum for approx 30 mins, a psychiatric nurse who has never met Mum (nor asked to meet her), a senior carer from the home and myself and my brother.
After a 2 hour discussion going through all the domains, my mother scored 4 high, 4 moderate, 2 low and 2 none.
We were asked to leave the room whilst the team discussed the findings, were called back in after only a few minutes and were told Mum does not qualify for CHC funding.
Irrelevant of the fact that we recorded that we do not agree the scores in two areas (we, and the home, believe Behaviour to be "Priority" and Psychological to be "High"), when reading the DST guidelines "Establishing a Primary Health Need" paragraph 31, it states that "A clear recommendation of eligibility to NHS continuing healthcare would be expected where there is a number of domains with high and/or moderate needs".
As Mum scored 8 out of 12 domains with high and moderate we would have thought that she would fall into this category but we were told in no uncertain terms that we were not interpretting the guidelines correctly and the team's decision was correct.
Any advice, comments or experience of these matters much appreciated.