LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) – Attorney General Dana Nessel
issued the following statement after the Michigan Senate on Thursday
overwhelmingly passed Senate Bill 77, which addresses nursing home
residents and their use of electronic monitoring.
“Protecting the rights of Michigan’s senior population is one of my
most important responsibilities as Attorney General. With Thursday’s
passage of Senate Bill 77, our state is taking a giant leap forward in
promoting the health and welfare of those who reside in nursing homes.
Permitting the voluntary use of monitoring devices in these facilities
will serve as a powerful deterrent against elder abuse and may provide
law enforcement with the concrete evidence we need to secure a
conviction if or when any abuse takes place. I am encouraged to see the
Senate pass this important bill in such an overwhelming, bipartisan
manner and am hopeful the House of Representatives will act quickly to
pass this bill before the end of session.”
Auburn police arrest woman on charge of financial exploitation of elderly person (Source: City of Auburn)
By Olivia Gunn
AUBURN,
Ala. (WTVM) - Auburn police arrested a Dadeville woman on a warrant
charging her with first-degree financial exploitation of an elderly
person.
Michelle
Harrelson Cosper, 56, was arrested Friday, October 2. Her arrest stems
from a criminal complaint that began in July 2020.
According
to Auburn police, officers received a report that involved the misuse
of funds belonging to a victim over 60 years old. Police say Cosper was
identified as a suspect and was arrested and charged after further
investigation.
Cosper
was transported to the Lee County Jail where she was held on a $7,500
bond. Auburn police say additional charges are possible and the case
remains under investigation.
LUND ALLEGES ATTORNEY INFILTRATED LUND'S PRIVILEGED DOCUMENTS AND GAINED
A TACTICAL ADVANTAGE IN THE CASE UNTIL HE WAS REMOVED BY COURT ORDER
Bradford Lund
PHOENIX, Oct. 5, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Bradford Lund, grandson of the late Walt Disney,
recently, through his counsel, participated in oral argument to the
Arizona Appellate Court following briefing where he is seeking to
overturn the dismissal of a lawsuit against Arizona attorney Bryan Murphy, and his firm. Lund's
lawyer argued that Murphy should not be allowed to escape liability on a
"statute of limitations" argument that didn't apply to this case.
Rather, Lund likened the harm caused
by Murphy to pollution cases, trespass cases, and domestic violence
cases which are often defined as "continuing torts" and cannot be
subject to a statute of limitations argument to save the wrongdoer,
until the harm itself is finally abated. Thus, Lund argued, the statute of limitations did not begin to run until Murphy and his firm were finally removed from the case.
Lund alleged in his December 2016 lawsuit that attorney Murphy and his law firm of Burch & Cracchiolo, which represented Lund's
estranged relatives in an ultimately failed
guardianship/conservatorship case, committed "abuse of [judicial]
process" due to Murphy's improper possession, disclosure, and
utilization of Lund's confidential and "privileged" legal file which was delivered to him in error by Lund's former estate planning firm.
Upon discovery of the privileged material, instead of merely
returning the file back unexamined, or destroying the copy, an action
that Lund alleged was his duty, Lund's filing, in a brief to the Arizona Court of Appeals, describes what happened next:
"[I]n an atmosphere of scorched-earth killer litigation, even after being advised by Mr. Lund's then counsel that the file should not have been disclosed to him, [Murphy] refused to destroy or return the file as requested. Instead, [Murphy] almost immediately examined every page, disclosed it to key participants of the litigation
including the guardian ad litem, court appointed investigator, and
multiple others. [Murphy] also went on to make notes about intimate
confidential portions of the file. Armed with this improper information
which he never should have even set eyes upon, [Murphy] remained as
adversarial counsel in Mr. Lund's highly acrimonious case. – Lund Opening Brief, pages 1-2 (Emph. added).
Murphy was subsequently disciplined in the form of an "admonishment" for this same conduct. Lund alleges it took years of legal wrangling and challenges by Murphy and his firm before the trial judge finally granted Lund's demand for disqualification of them, and, in so doing, found in pertinent part:
"…if disqualification is denied, [Lund] will be in litigation against an adversary who is armed with the knowledge of the advice that his own prior counsel gave to him.
Litigating against a party who possesses such an advantage is
antithetical to the values of an adversary system. While the burdens
placed on Petitioners would be, in the final analysis, only financial,
quantifiable, and their choice to bear, the burdens faced by Mr. Lund
would be those of a system failure, incalculable, and beyond his
ability to fully know." – Disqualification Ruling by Judge Bassett, page
5. (Emph. added).
Lund's filings compare Murphy's
actions to "noxious pollution spewing through the air," meaning that the
pollution continues and thus no "statute of limitations" is applicable
until the "pollution" itself is abated. The brief on appeal stated: "The
poisonous 'tactical advantage' of [Murphy] continued…until the fatal
wound to justice was finally abated by the removal of [Murphy and his
firm] as lawyers in the case." Indeed, in arguing for his day in court,
Mr. Lund alleges that damages to him continue to this day and will be proven to be "irreparable" at a jury trial.
Attorneys Margaret E. Daum, Kristina Arianina and Callan Smith
While COVID-19 infections are widespread, the virus
disproportionately affects the nation’s most vulnerable populations,
including seniors. According to an updated estimate from two healthcare experts, 45% of U.S. COVID-19 deaths have occurred in nursing homes and assisted living facilities.
Congress and the Trump administration have already provided funding
and resources to nursing homes and long-term care facilities throughout
the crisis, notably through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic
Security (CARES) Act [P.L. 116-136]. Given the disproportionate impact
of the virus on the residents and staff of nursing homes and assisted
living facilities, nursing homes and assisted living facilities should
expect federal legislative and oversight activity to continue to be a
priority throughout the remainder of this year and the next.
Ongoing federal legislative activity
Members on both sides of the aisle and in both chambers of Congress
have introduced legislation focused on COVID-19 testing, transparency
requirements, and reporting related to nursing homes and assisted living
facilities.
For example, H.R. 6800, the Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus
Emergency Solutions (HEROES) Act — that passed the House of
Representatives on May 15, 2020 — would provide $150 million for CMS to
establish and implement Nursing Strike Teams. The funding would be
allocated to states, and Nursing Strike Teams would deploy to SNFs and
nursing facilities (NFs) within 72 hours of three residents or employees
being diagnosed with or suspected of having COVID-19.
S. 3758, the Nursing Home COVID-19 Protection and Prevention Act of
2020, introduced by Sen. Robert Casey (D-PA), has received bipartisan
support. The bill would provide funds for states to support grouping
individuals based on COVID-19 status. The bill would also require CMS to
issue related guidance to outline which facilities would be permitted
to group individuals and strategies for effective implementation, and
provide detailed information regarding cases to residents, families, and
specified government agencies. The House companion, H.R. 6972, was
introduced by House Committee on Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on
Health Chair Anna Eshoo (D-CA).
H.R. 6998, Quality Care for Nursing Home Residents and Workers During
COVID-19 Act of 2020, introduced by Janice Schakowsky (D-IL), has also
received strong support. The bill would modify several requirements
related to quality of care, worker safety, and transparency for SNFs and
NFs during the public health emergency. The bill would also require CMS
to distribute funds to allow states to establish strike teams that may
be deployed to SNFs and NFs within 72 hours of three or more COVID-19
diagnoses. The Senate companion, S. 3644, was introduced by Sen. Cory
Booker (D-NJ).
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley (R-IA) also
introduced a bill to support nursing homes during the public health
emergency titled S. 4182, the Emergency Support for Nursing Homes and
Elder Justice Reform Act of 2020. The bill would provide nursing homes
with resources to respond to the COVID-19 emergency to protect the
health and safety of residents and workers, and it would reauthorize
funding for programs under the Elder Justice Act of 2009.
Ongoing oversight and investigations
In addition to funding and legislation, members of Congress are
conducting oversight of nursing homes and assisted living facilities.
These activities are joined by new reviews initiated by the Department
of Justice (DOJ) and the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS)
Office of Inspector General (OIG). These efforts include:
The House Committee on Ways and Means, House Committee on Energy
and Commerce, Senate Committee on Finance, and Senate Special Committee
on Aging have questioned how actions taken by the Administration and
the facilities themselves have caused the deaths of nursing home
residents and staff.
Senate Committee on Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and
House Committee on Energy and Commerce Ranking Member Greg Walden (R-OR)
sent a letter in June to the HHS OIG requesting an investigation into
whether five states—California, Michigan, New Jersey, New York and
Pennsylvania—violated federal guidance and pressured nursing homes to
accept patients who tested positive for COVID-19.
Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) wrote to the
HHS OIG in June requesting that the OIG look into reports that nursing
home residents across the country were instructed to hand over their
Economic Impact Payments (EIPs) to the nursing home or assisted living
facility in which they reside. House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Chairman Frank Pallone (D-NJ) and House Committee on Ways and Means
Chairman Richard Neal have also raised concerns in June about nursing
homes seizing residents’ EIPs.
In June, the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis sent
letters to CMS and to the nation’s five largest for-profit nursing home
companies, asking for detailed information regarding expenditures of
coronavirus relief funds. After learning that one recipient, Ensign
Group, had not spent the more than $100 million they received,
Subcommittee Chairman Clyburn urged Ensign Group to spend the money for
lawful purposes or return it. On August 5, Ensign Group reported that it
had returned the funds.
In July, Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and three other
senators wrote a letter to CDC Director Redfield and CMS Administrator
Verma, urging them to begin collecting and releasing demographic data on
residents and workers of nursing homes who are diagnosed with COVID-19.
Democrats in Congress have also used the nursing home crisis to
highlight the perceived mistakes of the Trump Administration. Sens. Bob
Casey (D-PA), Gary Peters (D-MI), and Ron Wyden (D-OR) released a report
detailing how the Trump Administration’s response to the COVID-19
pandemic contributed to the spread of the virus in nursing homes.
Additionally, Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Ed Markey (D-MA), and House
Committee on Oversight and Reform Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney (D-NY)
released a report on COVID-19 in Assisted Living Facilities, which found
that assisted living facilities have many of the same problems as
nursing homes in regards to COVID-19, but are receiving no help from the
federal government.
Additionally, in March, DOJ launched a National Nursing Home
Initiative to pursue civil and criminal actions against nursing homes
that provide grossly substandard care to their residents. By March, DOJ
had initiated investigations into approximately 30 nursing facilities as
part of this effort. In August, DOJ requested COVID-19 data from the
governors of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, citing
orders that required nursing homes to admit COVID-19 patients.
The HHS OIG has announced multiple oversight activities related to
nursing homes, including: (1) an audit of selected nursing homes to
determine whether they have sufficient programs for infection prevention
and control and emergency preparedness; (2) an audit of nursing homes’
reporting of information related to COVID-19; (3) a nation-wide, two
part study to examine how nursing homes have met the challenges of
COVID-19; and (4) a review of oversight by State Survey Agencies and the
federal government during the pandemic.
Looking ahead
With the election nearly two months away and a potential second wave
of the virus coming soon, it is likely the spotlight will remain on
nursing homes and how they are faring during the pandemic. Both parties
will continue to advocate for increased nursing home oversight,
transparency, testing, and reporting, and oversight activities and
legislation focused on these issues will likely continue to be a
priority in the 117th Congress.
Carter Williams, Who Unshackled Nursing House Residents, Dies at 97
In journal articles, conferences,
congressional hearings and conferences with regulators, Carter Catlett
Williams illuminated the miseries of nursing residence residents with
the sympathetic and descriptive powers of a novelist.
She advised tales like that of Miss
Cohen, whose restrictive weight-reduction plan prohibited the “heat,
aromatic chunk of challah” she had eaten on Friday nights her complete
life, inflicting Miss Cohen to refuse meals completely; and of Mr.
Denby, a “courtly, dignified former govt” who underwent “id loss” after
he grew to become “unable to rise to greet or bid farewell to his
visitor as a result of he’s tied to his chair.”
She amassed a whole lot of accounts
alongside these traces. They helped Ms. Williams affect the 1987 Nursing
House Reform Act, which required expert nursing services to keep up the
“bodily, psychological and psychosocial well-being of every resident.”
The regulation remodeled frequent
practices in nursing properties and strengthened a reform motion, a few
of whose arguments have been vindicated by the devastation of Covid-19.
“These phrases ‘psychosocial well-being’
are in there due to Carter,” stated Barbara Frank, a former affiliate
director of the Nationwide Residents’ Coalition for Nursing House
Reform. “That’s a contribution that we will hint again to Carter that
differentiates how some folks have fared higher in the course of the
pandemic.”
Ms. Williams died on Sept. 8 at
residence in Gloucester, Va. She was 97. Her daughter, Mary Montague,
stated the trigger was a coronary heart assault.
Ms. Williams wished extra dignity and
autonomy for nursing residence residents. She targeted on what she
referred to as “the homely particulars of every day life in a nursing
residence,” like the flexibility for residents to decide on once they
eat meals. In the usage of restraints, just like the one confining Mr.
Denby, Ms. Williams discovered a central goal for her advocacy.
Between 1980 and 1987, at the least 35
nursing residence residents died due to the usage of restraints. One
lady was strangled when hers was placed on backward. The units included
vests strapped to chairs and bands tying fingers and ft to mattress
rails. As Ms. Williams continuously emphasised, restrained folks
couldn’t go to the lavatory and even scratch an itch.
In the course of the Nineteen Eighties,
41 p.c of nursing residence residents have been put in restraints daily.
In New York State, the determine was 60 p.c.
Ms. Williams had a revelation on a visit
to Sweden. She visited a nursing residence with 210 residents, none of
them restrained. Ulla Turemark, the house’s director of nursing, defined
her philosophy of “individualized care”: In distinction to People
establishments, which rotated workers, the Swedish nursing residence
requested its staff to get to know the residents.
That enabled them to determine, for
example, which sorts of chairs and beds could be safe for various
residents with different types of dangers.
“The concentrate on restraints form of
introduced residence what it means to concentrate on individualized
care,” Ms. Frank stated.
The 1987 regulation severely restricted
the usage of restraints. “Individualized care” grew to become a
extensively held objective: In 2006, a memo issued by the Division of
Well being and Human Providers about “nursing residence tradition
change” used the time period 28 occasions in simply 16 pages.
Right now, solely about 1 p.c of nursing residence residents get restrained, Ms. Frank stated.
“Carter, I’d say, was the star of the restraint-free motion,” she added.
Even after the 1987 regulation and laws
that adopted it, Ms. Williams’s imaginative and prescient of on a
regular basis life in nursing properties had not been totally realized.
Within the late Nineteen Nineties, she led the founding of Pioneer
Community, a nonprofit devoted to creating nursing properties extra
humane. It helps coalitions working to reform institutional tradition in
22 states.
Pioneer Community’s suggestions embody
giving residents non-public rooms, facilitating time outside and
protecting workers and residents paired collectively, to allow them to
kind bonds.
These measures have made a distinction
in the course of the pandemic, when the coronavirus has unfold in
nursing properties amongroommates and a altering array of workers
members engaged on rotating foundation, all socializing indoors.
“What we now have been working to do is
change the design philosophy and practices of care communities and
senior dwelling communities away from a medical establishment mannequin
into one that’s targeted on the individual themselves,” stated Penny
Prepare dinner, the president of Pioneer Community. “One wouldn’t assume
that that may assist in an infection prevention, however it does.”
Catharine Mott Catlett was born on Sept.
2, 1923, in San Antonio. Her father, Landon Carter Catlett Jr., an
aviator, was stationed at a army base there. He died in a aircraft crash
in 1925, and his spouse, Catharine Sanders Mott Catlett, a homemaker,
renamed her daughter Carter, the title her father had passed by.
Ms. Williams grew up in Gloucester,
within the Tidewater area of Virginia, the place her household had lived
because the Seventeenth century. Her residence was Toddsbury, a
Seventeenth-century manor, however she might afford her tuition at
Wellesley solely by way of a beneficiant scholarship and gross sales
from her mom’s modest daffodil farming operation.
In 1949, she acquired a grasp’s diploma
from the Simmons Faculty of Social Work in Boston, the place she met T.
Franklin Williams, who was attending Harvard Medical Faculty. They
married in 1951.
In 1968, the household moved to
Rochester, N.Y., the place Ms. Williams labored at an area nursing
residence and noticed the indignities that may inspire her activism. In
1983, her husband grew to become the director of the Nationwide
Institute on Getting older, a division of the Nationwide Institutes of
Well being. Ms. Williams grew to become concerned in nationwide
politics, and he or she and her husband grew to become “an influence
couple on the planet of getting old,” Ms. Prepare dinner stated.
Mr. Williams died in 2011. Along with
her daughter, Ms. Williams is survived by a son, Thomas Nelson Williams;
six grandchildren; and three great-grandchildren.
In Ms. Williams’s remaining years, her
protection of outdated age grew to become private. When an airline
safety employee referred to Ms. Williams as “younger woman,” Ms.
Montague recalled, her mom replied, “Don’t rob me of my years.”
As her profession slowed down, she
discovered time to look by way of a small, battered field of letters
from her father. In opening remarks at a Pioneer Community convention,
she used the expertise to indicate the training and development
attainable even on the finish of a life.
“Suppose you didn’t know your father’s
love and his very lively half in your first 22 months till you have been
in your eighth decade,” she stated. “It’s the fantastic journey of my
third age.”
Trilogy Health Services did not comment on what happened at its Delphi facility. The company cited privacy concerns.
(Brock E.W. Turner, WFIU/WTIU News)
Trilogy Health Services did not comment on
what happened at its Delphi facility. The company cited privacy
concerns.
(Brock E.W. Turner, WFIU/WTIU News)
For months, thousands of residents in Indiana nursing
homes have been isolated. What began as an early-pandemic protection is
now eroding their quality of life.
Despite forming an essential and compassionate caregiver program, the
Indiana State Department of Health (ISDH) has deferred much of the
oversight and management to facilities themselves. Caregivers are caught
in the middle and often left powerless.
Vickie Ayres fights back tears as she remembers her mother, Carolyn,
who died just last month after a stay in at St. Elizabeth Healthcare
Campus in Delphi.
“She loved to travel and eat out and we would take her out several
times a week for outings, and when they locked down that was over,”
Ayres said. “They wouldn’t even take them out in the facility bus for a
drive around or anything. They took everybody and made their worlds that
were small, even smaller.”
Allegations Of Mistreatment At An Indiana Nursing Home
St. Elizabeth Healthcare Campus is owned by one of the Midwest’s
largest nursing home operators—Trilogy Health Services. When the
pandemic began, Ayres says she considered moving her mother out of the
facility and to her home, but she was concerned because there wasn’t an
accessible bathroom in her farmhouse.
“I didn’t feel like I was set-up properly in my home to be able to
have her here,” Ayres admits. “Six months later, knowing what I know, do
I wish I had done that?Yes.”
Ayres's mother, Carolyn, emjoyed travel, eating out and attending worship services at her church. (Photo Provided)
The place where her mom’s bathroom would have been is still
unfinished down the hall from her home office. Contractors have been
hard to find, she said.
But Ayres believes caregivers shouldn’t have to make that
decision—seeing a loved one or leaving them in a place where extra care
can be provided.
The situation quickly spiraled. Ayres says staff at St. Elizabeth
Healthcare kept her mom isolated in the facility’s COVID-19 wing for
weeks—even after she tested negative.
The company—which is one of the largest nursing home operators in the
Midwest declined an interview, and refused comment on the facility’s
polices in a provided statement.
“Out of respect for the privacy of our residents and their families,
we cannot comment on specific details regarding those in our care,” the
company wrote.
According to Ayres, it gets worse, she says her mother and other residents went months without receiving proper showers.She alleges staff restricted visits—even window visits—from her and other caregivers because “they were too dangerous.”
Ayres says she made the decision to move her mom due to the lack of visitation and her declining health.She would eventually test positive for COVID-19 leading Ayres believe her initial test was a false positive.
The facility’s owner, Trilogy, wrote it will, “continue to work
closely with the ISDH, pursue transparency, provide quality care, and
put our residents and their families first, just as we always have.”
Carolyn died on August 26 at the age of 81 due to complications of COVID-19.
Guidence Shifts Power To Facilities Instead Of Caregivers
Andrea Smothers is the ombudsman who serves the area, she says
nursing homes across Indiana have been forced to interpret vague
guidance and that’s leading to significant visitation variation.
“The guidance that they were given pretty much from our perspective
as advocates gave a lot of control to those facilities on how or when,
or under what circumstances they would allow visitors,” she said.
For example, a facility is not recommended to resume visitation
unless it has had no new cases for 14 days, its county positivity rate
remains low, and residents are notified.
Yet, multiple ombudsmen—who serve as advocates for caregivers and
their loved ones—say facilities are doing a poor job communicating these
visitation policies and updating caregivers on changes.
Those changes and that lack of communication, I think build the distrust by the caregivers,” she said.
However, a state program designed to increase access to facilities is plagued with problems of its own.
The bus at St. Elizabeth Healthcare Campus was parked
earlier this week. Caregivers and advocates say the facility has denied
window vistation. (Brock E.W. Turner, WFIU/WTIU News)
Instead of creating uniform visitation protocols, Indiana’s
essential and compassionate caregiver program has produced a patchwork
of guidance that experts and caregivers say is poorly communicated,
while also giving facilities too much discretion.
The department declined an interview, but provided a statement
saying, in part, “Recognizing the importance of this [essential
caregiver] role, we have encouraged this in facilities.”
Experts say the difference between “encouraging” and requiring is important.Under the current language, ISDH effectively lacks enforcement or oversight.
“Applications are not required to be submitted to the state
Department of Health, so we do not have any data on the number of
applications accepted or denied,” the department wrote.
During the state’s weekly COVID-19 briefing, Dr. Lindsay Weaver,
Chief Medical Officer for ISDH, said caregivers can still file a
complaint with ISDH if they feel a facility has wrongly denied their
application or isn’t meeting visitation requirements.
“Our infection preventionists work very closely with the long-term
care associations we have biweekly phone calls work with them to really
work through what does visitation look like and how we can do it
safety,” she said the department works with facilities and trade groups
to determine what is feasible.
“Of course, we always take family complaints or concerns and we’ll follow up on those,” Weaver said.
However, that process also favors facilities according Smothers.
“When I filed complaints on behalf of residents and their families
who couldn’t get in, as an essential family caregiver, I got a very
length, nice email from the surveyor saying, well, it’s up the facility,
and there’s nothing more I can do.”
Misaligned Priorities
Families with loved ones in long-term care facilities know their time
is limited. They’re tired how it is, and many don’t have the resources
or time to file complaints with facilities or the state.
Nearly everyone interviewed, agrees tightening visitation at the
beginning of the pandemic was the right decision, but few see the
rationality six months later.
“What we’re doing is wrong,” Ayres said. “And it’s wrong to an extent that I don’t think many people are aware of.”
Smothers agrees.
“How do we justify that?There may have been no on-on-one interaction that wasn’t supervised,” she said.
Mary Swinford, the Deputy Director of the state’s long-term care
ombudsman program understands the initial hesitancy, but believes now is
the time to find a solution.
“We do owe it to our seniors, our residents to continue to advocate
for them to have these visits. These visits are vital to residents.”
Ayres has a hard time understanding why more people aren’t outraged a
policy made out of necessity months ago remains in effect when rapid
testing capacity is available for athletes, college students, and other
populations.
“It is abuse,” she said. “At this point it is abuse because it is
long-term. It isn’t the short-term health crisis solution to the
pandemic.”
And that’s why she and others say they’re going to keep advocating for visitation.
“[Facilities and the state] could make it work, and it’s not that they can’t,” she said. “It’s that they won’t.And
that’s wrong,” Ayres said with tears in her eyes. “Even though my
journey is over with my mom, I have to speak for those people that are
left.”
The
decision to place an elderly relative in a care home is a difficult one
at the best of times, but the coronavirus pandemic and the restrictions
on visiting make it even harder. For one family it seemed like the best
solution before the virus arrived - but early last month they reversed
their decision and brought 95-year-old Rita home.
It's
late on a Saturday night, and a private ambulance pulls up outside a
care home in Norwich. Rita Perrott, a frail 95-year-old, is helped out
of the home in a wheelchair.
"Grandma!"
shouts her granddaughter, Anna, delightedly. They give each other a
long hug and a kiss. It's the first time in months such normal physical
contact has been possible.
Anna appears almost giddy with the audacity of what they're doing.
"We've stolen grandma!" she proclaims.
"A kidnap?" Rita asks, playing along with the joke.
"It's a heist!" says Anna. "We've come late at night to steal grandma back!"
"I
think they noticed," observes Ethan, one of the ambulance crew. The
care home, of course, has agreed for her to be discharged.
Rita in the ambulance
Anna
gently tells Rita they're on their way to the home of her
daughter-in-law, Sue - Anna's mother. She adds that the reason for the
move is that it had become almost impossible to visit her in the care
home.
Rita
is surprised by the late-night raid - they had no time to warn her in
advance - but delighted that she will be able to spend more time with
her family.
"Your poor mother!" she jokes.
Rita has dementia, and has grown increasingly weak and frail. She can no longer walk and even finds standing up painful.
Sue
and the rest of the family are going to care for Rita now. The doctors
say Rita is reaching the end of her life and the family could not bear
the thought of her dying alone in the care home.
Even
the ambulance crew is struck by the incongruity of what they're doing.
"We only ever take people into care homes," they tell Anna and her mum.
It's the first time they've taken anyone out of one.
Rita
had been in the home, Homestead House in Norwich, since the start of
the year. It began as temporary respite care, but morphed into a
permanent arrangement. Then coronavirus came along, and scuppered all
the family's hopes for the part they would play in Rita's care in her
final years.
With
the home in lockdown, at first visitors could get no further than the
car park, with Anna and Rita separated by a glass door, speaking to each
other by telephone.
Later,
visits were limited to one person visiting every two weeks, at a
distance of 2m and wearing full personal protective equipment (PPE).
It was a far cry from Rita's early weeks in the home, when Anna had even been able to help bathe her grandmother.
Although
it had been an agonising decision for the family to place her there,
Rita agreed it was the best care option for her, because everyone in the
family was leading such busy and complicated lives. And she says she
enjoyed living in the home, and making friends with the other residents.
For
years she'd been cared for by her son, John, Anna's father, but he
developed serious health problems and eventually had to have a leg
amputated. For a while he struggled even to look after himself. A spell
in hospital for Rita also exacerbated her problems; it was noticeable
that her dementia was growing worse.
Anna, Rita and John in March, discussing the future with a representative of the county council
At
one point mother and son were both in hospital at the same time. When
Rita was discharged, she was sent to Homestead House while a more
permanent care solution was arranged, with Norfolk County Council
agreeing to fund her social care.
"Well,
you just keep a troshin'," Rita says a few days after the heist, lying
in her newly delivered hospital bed in Sue's spare room, and being
waited on by the family. Rita has a wealth of old rural Norfolk sayings.
"Keep a troshin'" means to carry on threshing.
Rita
is carrying on gamely. Basking in the warmth of her family's love and
care, she has rallied to some extent and has been sipping sherry from a
straw, along with lots of tea and cake. She has a wicked sense of humour
and says, with a glint in her eye, that she's looking forward to
watching the Tour de France later.
"She likes their legs, you see," explains Anna. "She's only human."
Anna, Rita and Sue
For 95 years Rita has been at the heart of a close family.
Anna's
mum, Sue, who is divorced from Anna's father, says Rita practically
brought up her three grandchildren - Anna, Elly and Rachel.
"We had some good times all together," Sue recalls. "Lots of laughs."
"Very happy memories… It's been lovely," agrees Rita.
"This is so nice, thank you all," she says, taking quick, short shallow breaths.
"And I do appreciate all you have done. It's such a lovely feeling being loved, and loving back.
"Isn't
that nice when you can look back on a happy time, with a dear little
family, who've made me so welcome, and so much appreciated. And I thank
you all," she says. Then she punctures the moment before it gets too
maudlin: "Speech over…"
The
family says they understand that care homes have to be strict about
visiting, in order to keep coronavirus out. They have no criticism of
the care Rita received.
But as her health deteriorated they found the restrictions on visits increasingly intolerable.
Rita
lost a lot of weight in the home, and as she grew weaker she was taken
to hospital for a few days. And there, it turned out, visiting
arrangements were much more flexible.
"We were delighted when she went into hospital, because we could go and see her," says Anna. "It was really lovely."
But
within a few days the doctors said they couldn't help her. She was at
the end of life, they said, and would need to return to the care home.
Anna, Rita sipping sherry, and Elly
Anna
asked about the home's visiting arrangements when someone is dying and
was told that one family member could visit twice a week for just 20
minutes a time. Again, they would have to wear full PPE and remain at a
distance of 2m.
"You're
not even able to hold your loved one's hand when they're dying," says
Anna. "And the chances are you'd miss it anyway. The idea of her being
on her own to die just sounded barbaric and very cruel, not how we'd
planned for that to happen."
"The
most important time of grandma's life, being with her family was taken
away from us," says Sue. "That's why we made our decision for her to
come here."
Sue
recently retired as a nurse, so feels confident that she can care for
Rita. But she says she's aware that many families in a similar situation
would not have the space, time, or experience to do the same thing.
Rita's son John, her ex-husband, agrees. Despite the divorce, the family has remained close.
Rita, Anna and John earlier this year
"My
greatest fear was that Mum would have passed away and we would not have
been able to see her," he says. "I think there needs to be more flex in
these arrangements. We support care homes in what they're doing, but at
the same time it's a huge tension."
The
so-called heist was planned in a hurry, out of a fear that the care
home might lock down completely, and not let any of the residents out.
Now the family is concerned that restrictions on household mixing will become tighter.
Since
Rita came home, other relatives have also been able to visit Rita, and
will continue to do so as long as the rule of six remains in place. They
are determined to make the most of the time they have together.
The
family thinks Rita would have probably died by now had she remained in
the home and they believe her days are numbered even now she is with
them. It's something they have been coming to terms with over the last
few weeks, and they speak openly and honestly with Rita about it.
"It's not just about dying, but dying well," says Anna.
"We're waiting for a chair upstairs," says Sue. "It's standing room only in heaven but Grandma needs a chair."
"We'll know when it's time," adds Rita.
I asked her how she feels about dying.
"It's fine with me. Everything has worked out ever so well. You only live once don't you?"
"Will you be sad when she dies?" Anna asks her sister, Elly.
"Yes,
but I am the person I am because of her and what she did for me as a
child," says Elly. "It would just be the end of a lovely life. It will
be tainted with sadness because I can't imagine life without Grandma.
But it's ending how she would have wanted it to end."
On cue, Grandma suddenly breaks into an old song.
"Now is the hour for me to say goodbye…"
"Oh blimey," exclaims Anna.
"Soon I'll be sailing far across the sea," Rita continues.
"While I'm away, oh please remember me…
"And I can't remember the rest!"
The family breaks into laughter. It will no doubt be a good way to go.
