Mum lives in Hertfordshire - can she go to live in care home in another county?

beebee7

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Feb 13, 2015
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Hi, I'm Brenda. I live in Switzerland but have one brother who lives in Surrey.
Mum is not doing well (she lives on her own and refuses any kind of help). We can no longer have her assessed at the memory clinic and by the doc. as she refuses to go.
The time will come when my brother and I will have to place her in a care home.
My question is as in the title. I'm trying my best to take some of the workload off my brother but not having lived in England since I was 20 I really don't know how things work in England. I hope I'm on the right forum here - sorry if I'm not.
 
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Angela T

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Jul 13, 2014
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France
Hi Brenda,

My mother also lives in Hertfordshire and I am moving her from her NH in the UK to a NH in France, near where I live.

She wants to come to France, and as she is self-funding, we can move her as we wish.

I don't know whether it is so simple if your mother is LA or NHS funded.

No doubt others will be able to share their experience with you...
 

CLAIREDAY

Account on hold
Apr 22, 2015
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Hi, I'm Brenda. I live in Switzerland but have one brother who lives in Surrey.
Mum is not doing well (she lives on her own and refuses any kind of help). We can no longer have her assessed at the memory clinic and by the doc. as she refuses to go.
The time will come when my brother and I will have to place her in a care home.
My question is as in the title. I'm trying my best to take some of the workload off my brother but not having lived in England since I was 20 I really don't know how things work in England. I hope I'm on the right forum here - sorry if I'm not.

Hi Brenda

When my father was assessed a care home in the next county was proposed as no local care home would take him.
The home was going to come to see him but sadly my father died the day before they came.
From this I can only assume it is possible.
A dispute was going on because they wanted my father to self fund but this was not legally possible.
It had not been agreed he was eligible for CHC funding but I know the LA would have had to pay if he had not been eligible.

Claire
 

katek

Registered User
Jan 19, 2015
191
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Hi, I'm Brenda. I live in Switzerland but have one brother who lives in Surrey.
Mum is not doing well (she lives on her own and refuses any kind of help). We can no longer have her assessed at the memory clinic and by the doc. as she refuses to go.
The time will come when my brother and I will have to place her in a care home.
My question is as in the title. I'm trying my best to take some of the workload off my brother but not having lived in England since I was 20 I really don't know how things work in England. I hope I'm on the right forum here - sorry if I'm not.

Hi, and yes, you are on the right forum!

In answer to your question, I think it depends on your circumstances. As far as I know, if she would be 'self-funding' (using her own assets to pay for the care home placement), she would be able to go anywhere she wanted - subject to that particular care home assessing her as suitable.

However, it may be different if her assets are not sufficient for this and she has to be partly funded by social services, or if indeed her health needs were eventually deemed high enough to be fully funded by NHS Continuing Health Care (CHC), which is very hard to qualify for.

My sister was funded by social services in a different London borough (the other side of the city) from where she originally lived - partly because we could not agree on a suitable Nursing Home in that area, and partly because of ease of visiting. However, I don't know if that situation was very unusual. It was also a few years ago.

Re CHC, there is currently another thread by someone whose mother gets this in a care home in a different county from the CCG who is funding her, and now has to be moved back into that county so that they can more easily check on her. That might be the general rule now, I don't know.

You say that this decision may be some time off, so I'm assuming her AD is not too bad at the moment, but it is never too early to start planning ahead, not least because the disease can progress quite suddenly. You also say that she refuses to go to the memory clinic, which makes me think that she might well be reluctant to go into a CH anywhere - have you brought this up with her?

Hopefully other people will know more about the current rules and regulations regarding choice of location and will be along to advise you.
 

beebee7

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Feb 13, 2015
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Care home in another country and what happens if an Alzheimer patient won't go freely

Hi Katek
Thank you for replying. I think Mum is now in 2nd stage/starting third. We had everything set up for Mum, visits every day to administer tablets (which we later found pushed down the sofa), two visits for a couple of hours . .. but she refused to let the carers in. She has been and still is in complete denial. (My Dad had Alzheimer's, and I think one of the reasons for Mum's denial is that she is aware of what is wrong.) There is no way that we can talk to Mum about going into care - she just walks away and says it's not her is the lady down the road. This is so worrying to me because Mum is going to bits. Doesn't dress, doesn't go to the hairdresser's, doesn't wash her hair, the house is in shambles but still she talks coherently - yes she repeats herself and gets facts wrong but she's nowhere near being like my Dad was when we put him into care.
Furthermore, my Dad was in a home which was under police investigation regarding two deaths and for this reason they did an autopsy on my Dad, which put us all into shock and since them Mum has deteriorated. Maybe a reason for her complete denial.
I asked a question a couple of weeks ago but didn't really get replies. Maybe I'll have more luck this time:
Mum will absolutely not go freely into a care home. What happens in this case? Do they sedate people or what?
Sorry, I've gone way off on a tangent here. My apologies.
Thank you
 

sistermillicent

Registered User
Jan 30, 2009
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Hi Brenda, can you clarify, do you mean another county or another country?
You can't sedate someone to put them in a care home as far as I am aware. It is difficult to get someone to agree to go to a care home, I am afraid my mum, who was not coherent when we did it, went to a care home the first time after being told we were going out for tea. She was livid when we got there and told her she was staying for a few days but the care home staff were very good and got her settled with a cup of tea. It wasn't a bed of roses but she stayed there for the whole two weeks.

I am afraid you may need to use subterfuge to get your mum to accept care of any kind..
 

beebee7

Registered User
Feb 13, 2015
80
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Hi Sistermillicent

Mum lives in Hertfordshire and my brother would like to have her closer to where he lives in Surrey when the time comes for her to go into a home.
My Mum has always been a gentle loving person but when I've been there and the carers came she would become aggresive and abusive immediately. I'm so frightened of when that day comes that we have to bring her to a care home, because at the stage she is now, she will go screaming and kicking - I know she will. That's why I asked the question regarding sedation. She's already been abusive to the neighbours when they called to ask if she was OK (after they heard her wailing in the night) and threw a cup and glass at my brother.
She such a private, independant person and it still shows. However, we know that the time is coming very close when we have to take this awful path. She is so very frightened and I can't help her. So sad. Thank you
 

katek

Registered User
Jan 19, 2015
191
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Hi Katek
Thank you for replying. I think Mum is now in 2nd stage/starting third. We had everything set up for Mum, visits every day to administer tablets (which we later found pushed down the sofa), two visits for a couple of hours . .. but she refused to let the carers in. She has been and still is in complete denial. (My Dad had Alzheimer's, and I think one of the reasons for Mum's denial is that she is aware of what is wrong.) There is no way that we can talk to Mum about going into care - she just walks away and says it's not her is the lady down the road. This is so worrying to me because Mum is going to bits. Doesn't dress, doesn't go to the hairdresser's, doesn't wash her hair, the house is in shambles but still she talks coherently - yes she repeats herself and gets facts wrong but she's nowhere near being like my Dad was when we put him into care.
Furthermore, my Dad was in a home which was under police investigation regarding two deaths and for this reason they did an autopsy on my Dad, which put us all into shock and since them Mum has deteriorated. Maybe a reason for her complete denial.
I asked a question a couple of weeks ago but didn't really get replies. Maybe I'll have more luck this time:
Mum will absolutely not go freely into a care home. What happens in this case? Do they sedate people or what?
Sorry, I've gone way off on a tangent here. My apologies.
Thank you

Sorry to hear about your dad and also your Mum's denial - which is actually quite common. It does, however, make any decisions very difficult for you.

My father was not dissimilar, but the difference was he was living with my mum who did a brilliant job of caring for him. He was always very reluctant to go to any kind of day centres etc although we all did our bit of 'babysitting' to give her a break. There came a point when he had lost coherent speech and didn't really know where he was anyway, so he couldn't actually voice any opinions either way, and wasn't actively resisting. At this point there was no way my mother would have wanted him to go into a care home if she felt that he would be unhappy there.

The crunch came when his behaviour started to change dramatically and he had episodes of violence, which led the mental health team to become involved. He was taken by them for a six-week hospital assessment during which time he became doubly incontinent overnight, and deteriorated to a point when he would not be able to return home with my mother. The decision was therefore taken out of her/our hands. He has since been sectioned and is now in a lovely, very small NHS unit -quite oblivious to where, or even who, he is.

As your mother lives on her own, I am wondering if she might agree to a live-in carer (circumstances permitting) as an alternative to a care home, or do you think she would resist that too?

PS - I've just re-read and saw that she did in fact have visiting carers which she refused, so maybe the live-in carer would not be an option then - sorry!
 
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Witzend

Registered User
Aug 29, 2007
4,283
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SW London
Hi Katek
Thank you for replying. I think Mum is now in 2nd stage/starting third. We had everything set up for Mum, visits every day to administer tablets (which we later found pushed down the sofa), two visits for a couple of hours . .. but she refused to let the carers in. She has been and still is in complete denial. (My Dad had Alzheimer's, and I think one of the reasons for Mum's denial is that she is aware of what is wrong.) There is no way that we can talk to Mum about going into care - she just walks away and says it's not her is the lady down the road. This is so worrying to me because Mum is going to bits. Doesn't dress, doesn't go to the hairdresser's, doesn't wash her hair, the house is in shambles but still she talks coherently - yes she repeats herself and gets facts wrong but she's nowhere near being like my Dad was when we put him into care.
Furthermore, my Dad was in a home which was under police investigation regarding two deaths and for this reason they did an autopsy on my Dad, which put us all into shock and since them Mum has deteriorated. Maybe a reason for her complete denial.
I asked a question a couple of weeks ago but didn't really get replies. Maybe I'll have more luck this time:
Mum will absolutely not go freely into a care home. What happens in this case? Do they sedate people or what?
Sorry, I've gone way off on a tangent here. My apologies.
Thank you

We had to get my mother to her care home by deception - we were all 'going out for lunch'. The CH had asked us to arrive for lunch, and my mother did actually think it was a restaurant. I can't say it was easy once she realised she was staying, but we had no choice - she was in urgent need of 24/7 care and would never in a million years have agreed to go.
However she was self funded and I think this can often make a difference, since we did not need the approval of social services and in fact had not involved them at all.
 

In a Whirl

Registered User
Feb 23, 2015
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The thing you need to be aware of is if an assessment is made to determine whether your mother is mentally capable of deciding where she will live. If she is deemed incapable then she will have no choice in the matter no matter what her wishes are.
 

Wirralson

Account Closed
May 30, 2012
658
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The thing you need to be aware of is if an assessment is made to determine whether your mother is mentally capable of deciding where she will live. If she is deemed incapable then she will have no choice in the matter no matter what her wishes are.

I am sorry to say that what you write above quite often happens in practice, but, under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and the associated Code of Practice link below:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploa...4660/Mental_Capacity_Act_code_of_practice.pdf

a person without capacity is supposed to have their wishes taken into account. If need be this would allow the OP's mother's wishes to be taken into account.

Angela T mentions moving her mother to France: AIUI France has flilial responsibility laws, so unlike the UK, where, to simplify things slightly, when funds run out responsibility passes to the Local Authority, in France the family can find itself shouldering some or most of the bill. This has been posted on here but I can't find the link at the moment - I will post it when I find it - it may even have been Angela T who posted it. This may not be an issue for the her, but may be useful to others.

W

Edited to add: A relvant link is here although I don't think it is the one I had in mind:

http://forum.alzheimers.org.uk/showthread.php?4197-Attendance-allowance&p=42899&viewfull=1#post42899

It was indeed Angela T who posted the link I remembered. Here it is:

http://forum.alzheimers.org.uk/show...youre-absent&p=1076548&viewfull=1#post1076548
 
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