Carers UK backs carer's fight for justice

Helen was forced to leave her brother, Matthew, at a local hospital after the cuts in his care package from eleven hours a week to a staggeringly low five and a half hours made it impossible for her family to care for him at home. Matthew (43) suffers from serious mental and physical health conditions – he is deaf, almost completely blind and suffers from a very rare and serious skin condition. He also has a very serious form of Aspergers syndrome, leaving him with the mental age of nine.

Upon being registered at the local hospital Matthew had to be taken by ambulance to a hospital which specialises in psychiatric care for the deaf. He will be staying here until a suitable care package is set up and running.

Helen says: “I really feel at my wits’ end. I have two teenage sons and together with my 72-year-old mother, we struggle to provide Matthew with the care he needs and deserves. He is temporarily being cared for at the only mental health hospital in the south of England for the deaf and I am lucky they could step in so quickly. But I fail to understand why it had to get to this stage. And why our local Primary Care Trust cannot see that we simply cannot cope with even less of a care package than before. ”

Carers UK, which provides campaigning support, information and advice to the UK’s six million carers, believes the case highlights only too well the barriers which many carers face. Imelda Redmond, Chief Executive of the charity, comments:

“Matthew’s care package was first cut at the beginning of 2007. Since then, and despite the Department of Health ordering a full investigation into the family’s treatment, Redbridge Primary Care Trust have refused to accept the inadequacy of Matthew’s care package. This type of situation simply can’t be allowed to continue. It’s obvious for anyone to see how desperate the Coughlan family’s situation is. But the sad truth is that the issues faced by the Coughlans are being repeated up and down the country on a regular basis.

“We have long argued for a comprehensive overhaul of the current care system. Carers have been telling our helpline CarersLine for many months that care packages are being tightened and services being withdrawn. Following the launch of the government’s National Carers’ Strategy in June - and in the preparations for the forthcoming green paper on Care and Support - it is even more imperative that carers’ voices are heard”