SIX DECADES AND COUNTING

Does anyone feel the same as me that there is a period of time where the Health Services start to disengage themselves from Patient Health.

Sometimes I wonder if this cut out period starts when we arrive at sixty years old, and that disengagement is staggered through to your seventies and eighties. Leading through to been patted away to a nursing home until all your money has been used up and the Council Social Services cannot afford to look after you. Passing the parcel now starts where no-one really wants to be left with the Parcel that is you.

BOB

[Hidden]

I find it all depends upon the individual health professional. Certainly problems the elderly have are often less interesting and have a less positive prognosis but I find most sensitive and caring professionals care about PEOPLE regardless of their age. x

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Hello Rose,

Over the last ten years I have seen views of the Patient, GP Surgery, Medical Charities and Hospitals and have tended meetings associated with healthcare Now I am beginning to deal with patients (clients) and ways to make services better. by looking for clients views of how they feel that the NHS is working or not. Now I have my views that will differ from others I am looking for what people think of their NHS ??

BOB

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Hello Rose,

Over the last ten years I have seen views of the Patient, GP Surgery, Medical Charities and Hospitals and have tended meetings associated with healthcare Now I am beginning to deal with patients (clients) and ways to make services better. by looking for clients views of how they feel that the NHS is working or not. Now I have my views that will differ from others I am looking for what people think of their NHS ??

BOB

[earthwitch]

You have hit a raw nerve there Bob. I get the very strong feeling that my current consultant can't wait until I'm sixty so he can get rid of me as having purely age-related problems. With me, its made worse by the fact that I clearly had this disease as far back as my teenage years, but because I just learned to live with it, I never sought help until I suffered a really disabling and extended flare when I was in my early 50's, so as far as the consultant is concerned thats when my problems started and he is just not interested in any history before then.

[katieoxo60]

Thank you Bob for your post, it made me smile, its so true but also it hits a nerve. We do seem to be pensioned off from the NHS once we reach a certain age a lot of things are put down to age related. I recall many years ago an optician telling me my eyesight was due to age deterioration at the grand old age of 40. I was born with an eye defect nothing to do with age. And some people over eighty still have good eyesight don't they?

[Hidden]

I think it's right that we have specialists in all areas including old age. I don't think though that it should be a strict age cut off at 60, because so many young people have age related diseases. Their needs are different from an older person, who may be able to take early retirement to benefit their health. Whereas younger people have school, university, eork, family life to cope with as well.

Personally, I have unofficially opted out of NHS care for my chronic pain. There is nothing they can do at this moment in time, so rather than waste my own precious time chasing dreams just to be shattered, I do my own thing. But, if I get any other unrelated health issues I'll go and see what they can do for me.

I don't see the NHS as failing me, there are treatments I could have, pain killers I could take but the upheaval they would cause to my life just are worth it for the little benefit it would bring.

[Calceolaria]

Archbishop Carey has today given his support to the right to die movement. I would rather be able to choose this path when the time comes, than have to go in and out of hospital, being a burden on society and my family/ ending my pain-filled or unwanted drug-filled days in an Uncare Home.

[johnsmith]

This is tricky. As more and more of the body breaks down because of old age there is no treatment that can repair the breakdown. Medicine has been about: something has been injured by trauma - here is our treatment for it.

There is no treatment for old age. There is not enough money to do all the things needed. New approaches are needed.

I am a student of Alexander Technique, Mindfulness, meditation, T.ai Chi, Psychology, Massage, Reflexology, Bio mechanics, engineering and I don't know what else to put here. The regime of the patient being the dumb recipient of what ever treatment the consultant or GP deems to give is coming to an end. The dishonesty of Big Pharma and the consultants who have aided the dishonesty have been exposed in reports that the public can read.

I was at a meeting in an NHS health facility where new approaches were discussed. Things are changing. However like all theories it is said "new theories do not take root until the advocates of the old theories have died."

There is a big need for patients who have the means to be guided to helpful complementary therapies. The is no money in the NHS to give all the treatments needed. Getting those can can afford to pay for complementary therapies to the needed complementary therapies will reduce the burden on the NHS and enable better help for those of lower means.

There is a need for programs to raise the internal body awareness of patients so that they are better able to discern the activities which will cause them damage and those activities which will improve their quality of life. Moving the way the body has been designed to move as an engineering structure is a case in point. Being aware how the requirements of the brain change depending of what activity is being engaged in is a case in point. This is moving from: I am a medical consultant who has diagnosed X and this is what treatment I prescribe to one of You can manage your quality of life by becoming aware of XYZ and how doing things this way will cause this difficulty and by dong things that way will will help compensate for what is happening.

The above is not a five minute consultation it is hours of work by the patient and consultants. The potential benefits to patients who have chronic conditions will be enormous.

[Calceolaria in reply to johnsmith]

Hasten the day!