End to Junk Mail

Posted on February 26, 2013 by john graham

I have written a lot about the postal service, because I think it remains an essential lifeline for many older people and means an occaisional visit from a friendly face.  ( To  read my earlier blogs click on “Grumblesmiles Post” in the TAG CLOUD)   However, one of my consistent complaints has been the deluge of junk mail we all receive.

Now it appears an inventive postie in Birmingham has found an eco-friendly solution to the problem.   He buried more than 20,000 letters which he claimed were junk mail in his back garden.    Sadly his short-sighted bosses didn’t see it as a great service improvement. The creative free-spirited postman was prosecuted and given an 8 month jail sentence.

Many of his customers may well have voted him  :-

   Postman of the Year

Posted in SMILES | Tagged | 5 Comments

“Elderly Bouncers”

Posted on February 24, 2013 by john graham

Slow stream rehabilitation is a thing of the past.   Now they rush elderly people out of hospital faster than they push them in.   Unblocking beds is almost as vital as unblocking drains.   Hot bedding, just like hot desking, is becoming the new “just in time” technique in the NHS.   Nobody should be in hospital one minute more that it takes to fill in all the paperwork.

The problem is that older people don’t heal as quickly as the young and often don’t have anyone to look after them when they return home.   So surprise, surprise they frequently come bouncing back to the NHS not long after they have been discharged as “CURED”.

16% of all over 75’s needed emergency re-admission within 28 days of being discharged.  In 2010/11 that amounted to 210,000 rebound admissions.   That compares to 103,000 re-admissions in 2001/2.   In the meantime rehabilitation and convalescence wards are words that have disappeared from the NHS dictionary of helpful hints and tips.

If you were a manufacturer or a retailer and 16% of your product was returned as defective, you would soon go out of business.    In the NHS each discharge of an elderly person is counted as a “successful clinical episode”.

                                  So that’s alright then

Posted in HEALTH, N.H.S. | 1 Comment

” A Step Too Far? “

Posted on February 21, 2013 by john graham

Assisted suicide has been a recurring subject in GrumbleSmiles ever since I wrote about it in my very first blog.   (See “LUCY DIED TODAY” by clicking in the ARCHIVE – MARCH 2010).

I have no doubt there is sincerity on both sides of the cases for and against.   I also imagine there is great personal tragedy behind many of the individual stories brought forward to support the argument for legalising assisted suicide.   They could have no better advocate than Lord Falconer, the former Lord Chancellor.   He has a barrister’s certainty about the righteousness of his case and the political guile to manoeuvre his way through parliamentary legislation.

A few years ago he set up an “independent” group of people to review the issue.    Now he assures us that “the public” have lost confidence in the present law.    His next step is to pilot a bill through the House of Lords to legalise assisted suicide for terminally ill patients with less than a year to live.   However, in an interview with The Times, he talks about people who are terminally ill with “only just months or weeks to live”.

His subtle change of words betrays the manipulation behind his argument.   It is the beginnings of a step too far.   A diagnosis of terminal illness with 3 weeks to live is a lot more certain than a one year prediction.   The safeguard of having two doctors to certify the diagnosis is equally open to manipulation.   Dr Harold Shipman showed us the possibilities.

Doubtless over the years to come the current legal position will be softened further in favour of assisting the terminally ill to die.

This may be a right thing to do, but add in the “burden” elderly people are putting on the NHS and the next step will be for a lawyer to widen the definition of terminal illness to include dementia.

Then you are truly on the slippery slope with no turning back.    We may even be there already.    It would not be the first time the law has to catch up with reality, but it is a frightening prospect.

Posted in Assisted Suicide, ELDERLY UK POLICY, HEALTH | Tagged | 1 Comment

“Simple Connections”

Posted on February 19, 2013 by john graham

A while ago I was grumbling about the complexity of modern technology for many older people.   What appears and appeals to the younger generation as the latest advance in easy living, is anything but to their grandparents.   (See my earlier blog by clicking on TECHNOLOGY GAP in the TAG CLOUD).

What should and could be a revolution in enabling technology, more often leaves older people behind.   Feeling less capable and more bewildered about how things work.

Telephones are a classic example.   Many of the grandparent generation grew up without telephones in every household.   Everyone knew how to use the public telephone boxes and all carried pennies in their pocket or purse.   Soon everyone had mastered the phone, and it became a lifeline as families left home and moved away.

But the technology advanced.   Operators and switchboards have long since disappeared – the new exchange is an automated robotic response of press 1 for this, press 2 for that, press 3 for the other – and if all else fails, press x and you can speak to a real person who wishes you would not bother him or her.

Stuck for a number you could use the telephone directory — if you haven’t torn it up 🙂 or used it to replace the missing castor on the sofa.    Alternatively you could dial directory enquiries on 192.    Now that too has been improved with extra numbers – 118 118 and  higher connection charges.

Meanwhile, the latest phones have moved into the clouds.   All pictures, apps, bells, whistles, texts and endless ring tones.   3G and 4G is as incomprehensible to the older generation as press button A and B is to their grandchildren.

The good news is that Age UK have launched a new simple mobile phone specially designed for older people.    Touchscreen, big print, only eight buttons, and long battery life.

Recognition at last that there is a grey market that is worth investment.   We need many more products to be re-engineered into simple, easy to use technology.

   Grey Technology

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“Retirement Planning”

Posted on February 17, 2013 by john graham

Thinking about taking the first steps onto the retirement ladder, I googled “Retirement Planning”, as any worldwide web wise pensioner would do these days.    And guess what?  All the top web links on Google are about money.    Pensions, annuities, savings and investments.    The advertising is all about financial planning, equity release and writing a will.

That tells you a lot about the immediate worries people have on reaching retirement.   It also reflects the limited horizons and lack of vision people have in relation to their lives after their working life is over.   Few people look beyond working when they are still at work.

At the bottom of the Google list, I found “The Retirement Planning Council”.    Somewhat surprisingly I had not heard of it – then I noticed it was in Ireland.   It is run by a charity and led by Chief Executive John Higgins who doesn’t look a bit like a World Champion Snooker player.   They run courses all over Ireland aimed at helping people plan a happy retirement.

They conducted a survey of over 1,000 people who had attended one of their courses.  Here are some of the interesting results:-

  • 81% were planning to retire soon
  • Most people were aged between 58 – 65
  • 80% were married
  • Only 29% were worried about their financial future
  • 86% expressed lack of trust in financial advisors
  • 53% do not engage in financial planning
  • 38% intended to continue working beyond 65 – mostly part-time

In terms of active retirement:-

  • 69% hoped to live out former dreams
  • 74% saw retirement as a new life chapter
  • 38% wanted to travel
  • 13% wanted more time for hobbies
  • Only 3% wanted to pursue education courses
  • 59% were involved with clubs and organisations – golf, community groups and health clubs were the most popular

In health terms:-

  • Just 16% expressed concern about future health
  • 81% describe themselves as computer literate
  • 86% have computer at home
  • 90% are uninterested in social networking
  • 79% were willing to be volunteers, mainly locally with community groups, churches and charities

In terms of wealth:-

  • 35% have not completed a will
  • 76% have not thought about enduring power of attorney.

Time to start planning for the next period of your life.

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“Chillingly Killing”

Posted on February 12, 2013 by john graham

As I write this blog I am tucked up in bed with the central heating up high.   Outside it’s  minus 4ºC, the ground is covered with 6″ of snow and the roads and footpaths are sheets of ice.

It’s Christmas card weather.   Little children love it – all snowballs, snowmen and footprints in the snow.

Inside many thousands of elderly households the freezing weather won’t feel so welcome.

Several millions of pensioners live in fuel poverty while the average gas and electricity bill for over 65’s rose to £1,350 last year.   Energy costs have doubled in the last 6 years and continue to rise well above the rate of inflation.

£7 million older people are worried about the cost of heating their homes.

Meanwhile politicians contemplate cutting winter fuel payments for pensions, while they wrap themselves up in a coat of eye-catching, vote-catching warm words:-

  • The Green Deal – loans for home improvements;
  • The Warm Home Discount Scheme – £130 saving on energy bills;
  • The Energy Company Obligation Scheme – subsidised home insulation.

The Energy Minister – Mr Greg Baker – said recently “a warm house should be a given, not a luxury.   That is why we want to make sure everyone is aware of the support available.”

This is the same Government that forecasts that there will be 24,000 “excess” winter deaths this year.

Ladderhealth - Chill Kill

  It’s time for action, not warm words !

Posted in HEALTH | Tagged | 1 Comment

“Magnetic Mice”

Posted on February 10, 2013 by john graham

My mousey friends have again been helping out with research into memory.   Studies have shown that by using a magnetic coil, mouse memory and learning can be improved.   They are already clever little devils.   They will be doing degrees in mathmatics or media studies next !

The same technique  –  called Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation  –  is now going to be trialled on patients with early stage memory loss.   It involves holding a magnetic coil over their heads while they try to answer quiz questions and complete puzzles.

magnetmiceJPG[1]

If it works, you can imagine in years to come we could all be walking around the streets looking like Roger Moore in “The Saint”.

I wonder if it will help me do the fiendish Sudoku?

Posted in Dementia, HEALTH | 2 Comments

“Long Term Care Fairytale”

Posted on January 31, 2013 by john graham

After 2 1/2 years in power and with only 2 1/2 years left before the next election, the Government is once again beginning to think about the Grey vote.

Before the last election, there was a feeding frenzy of discussion, argument and false hope politicians promises about the future funding of long-term care.   (Click on “DILNOT” in the TAG CLOUD to read more).

The Conservatives had a very simple and simplistic idea of a voluntary insurance for a mere £8,000.   That looks like quite a bargain compared to what they are now proposing.  The Labour Party had an equally interesting alternative of a £20,000 charge levied when you die, but this was quickly dropped when it became labelled the death tax.    Both ideas were useful conversation pieces for TV debates and to capture some votes, but neither stood up to any proper evaluation nor the test of time.

After the election, the Coalition Government commissioned Andrew Dilnot to find a better idea.   Some time later he came up with an answer which cost money and they didn’t like that either.    So they all sat on a toadstool and thought for a while – and then they thought some more.    Until one day they realised that there would be another election soon and they needed to come up with a proposal.    A magical pot of gold at the end of a mythical care rainbow.    So the Chancellor thought about “Dilnot Lite”.   A new idea but with less Government money.

To the politicians this seems like a very good idea because it looks like they have finally made a decision.    In practice it will leave most people paying what they would have paid before.

Ladderman6V2

Posted in HEALTH | Tagged | 3 Comments

“New Ways of Working”

Posted on January 29, 2013 by john graham

Set against the background of longer later life , we need to develop new patterns of working.   The idea of working full-time flat-out and then…………..you suddenly come to a FULL STOP!   For many unlucky people you stop dead literally, within a few years of retiring.

Previously retirement age was 60 for women and 65 for men and an inadequate state pension was supposed to support you for the rest of your life.   If you were lucky, a cradle-to-grave employer looked after you with a company final salary pension, but for all bar the public sector, this paternalistic approach of employers has disappeared and been replaced by a scrap heap mentality.

Now that  is all changing, driven by economic necessity rather than any sense of benevolence.   The former cliff-edge of statutory retirement age has been abolished.   The universal state pension is being put back until 67 and maybe even 70 eventually.   In the name of equality, women’s pensions are being deferred to be brought in line with men.   The problem now is that other social structures haven’t changed to reflect the newly available army of older workers.   There are only so many lollypop lady jobs out there !

We require a new , more positive attitude to work in later life.   Part-time rather than full-time and using the valuable skills acquired in a lifetime of employment.   We also need new types of jobs to be created and a more flexible approach to job sharing.

  • A job sharing team of grannies and granddads could provide a child-minding service for working parents; not necessarily just their own grandchildren;
  • A lot of grannie and grandad teaching assistants could provide one to one support for young school children, that would guarantee they can read and write before they move out of primary school;
  • For older children, their “grandparent” helpers could provide a stand-in additional parent for single parent families, who could focus on developing life skills – cooking, housekeeping, budgeting,handyman.   In return the youngsters could teach computing skills to the older generation.
Posted in ELDERLY UK POLICY | Tagged | 2 Comments

“Dementia Friends”

Posted on January 27, 2013 by john graham

A welcome new initiative by the Alzheimer’s Society is aiming to recruit and train 8,000 volunteers.   They will in turn seek to find one million volunteers to help and support dementia sufferers and their carers.

There are estimated to be nearly 700,000 sufferers in the UK, although less than half of these have been formally diagnosed.  This often means they are unsupported or wrongly treated and left to struggle on alone.

Effectively, this is an admission that the State can’t cope and the problem of dementia is being passed to voluntary organisations and individual volunteers.   Nonetheless, it is an opportunity to provide much needed support to families who are often under great strain coping with dementia.

One million volunteers will not be easy to find and organise, so it is a big challenge for the Alzheimer’s Society, but there will be great rewards for the volunteers knowing that their help will provide relief and respite to carers.

It is a great opportunity for the younger generation of retired people to give help to older people in need.   They may need such help themselves one day.

Posted in Dementia, HEALTH | Tagged | 1 Comment