This is both very bad and very good. Bad because of the obvious reason that old people are often treated disgracefully in hospitals and care homes; good because people in positions of authority are finally sitting up, taking notice and trying to do something about it.
Two surveys this week reveal shaming attitudes towards the old in institutional care.
The first showed the way hospital staff deal with the elderly who have dementia. One hospital consultant admitted: “Sometimes you’re more veterinary in approach. And then you perhaps may not be treating them in the same way as someone else you can talk to.”
An occupational therapist remarked that her colleagues don’t have enough practical elements in their training. “I don’t think I actually saw any old people,” she concluded shamefully.
Even more horrifically another consultant summed up his attitude like this: “They can’t do anything for themselves, they won’t feed themselves, they can’t get out of bed themselves, you can’t be sure they’re drinking, they’re often incontinent... they are hugely sapping of our scarce resources.”
Two surveys this week reveal shaming attitudes towards the old in institutional care
Isn’t that appalling? Of course it’s true that dementia patients can be very difficult to deal with. When I used to visit my mother in her care home the most confused old ladies were either catatonic or simply howled over and over again.
Neverthless, as I observed there, dementia can be handled with kindness and sensitivity. There are many excellent books on the subject and many care homes have specialist knowledge of treating these patients.
Another report this week was also shocking but at least it reached some positive conclusions. This comes from a commission of senior NHS managers, charities and council chiefs, which heard evidence from more than 40 organisations working with older people, as well as doctors, nurses and carers. They found that “age discrimination is the most common form of discrimination in the UK”.
The elderly, they said, are patronised, neglected and denigrated as “bed-blockers”. The report’s conclusion is that this kind of attitude should be treated as severely as racist or sexist abuse. And it offered a number of sensible and helpful recommendations, among them that applicants for caring jobs must be compassionate as well as skilled and that they should be observed working with old people before being given a job.
It’s all so blindingly obvious, isn’t it? And this in a week when former TV host Fiona Phillips movingly described her father’s death from Alzheimer’s, drugged up to the point where he had become unrecognisable to her. She blames his death on a vast mixture of antipsychotic drugs and sedatives.
“I am appalled by the lack of care and understanding in the medical profession,” Fiona says.
So, it appears from the surveys, is pretty much everyone else. The Government must act on the commission’s recommendations, and what a good idea it would be to involve Fiona. And then finally with her experience and passion to improve all of this, we might begin to care for the elderly in a way which is kind, respectful and compassionate and also allows them to keep their dignity.
In other words, all the things we would wish and expect for ourselves when the time comes.