‘The rest is back to normality but I can’t hold my mum’s hand’
THE daughter of a 92-yearold woman in a care home has spoken of her anguish after her mother told her she “wished she was dead” after six months without physical contact from her family.
Linda Watson’s mother’s home – Bothwell Castle – is in Lanarkshire, whose health board is among that have ruled out the re-introduction of indoor visits because the risk of Covid-19 is deemed too high.
The First Minister said yesterday that the country is in a “fragile state” after a three month-high in the number of cases – 160 in the past 24 hours.
The majority of new cases are in the central belt, with 69 in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde health board area and 27 in Lanarkshire.
Care home providers were asked to submit their plans for indoor visits to the relevant health board by August 24.
Plans would then be signed off once the board’s Director of Public Health was satisfied the home met all the criteria for indoor visiting. It included being free of Covid19 for 28 days and participating in a staff testing programme. Around 200 care homes are said to be affected by the continued restriction.
It has also emerged many care homes missed the deadline for setting out their proposals.
Mrs Watson’s mother Ellen suffers from mild dementia and chronic delirium, which can lead to a sudden period of confusion that comes on within hours or days. Linda was her full-time carer until shortly before lockdown when she reluctantly accepted that her mother required specialist care.
She is restricted to one weekly visit from outside her mother’s room in a patio area and window conversation.
She said: “I love my mum; I miss her. She is in her final years and we cannot comfort each other, cannot hold each other’s hand, cannot hug. It is inhumane.
“If my mum passes away before I have been able to do any of those things I won’t be able to cope with the fact that she will think I have abandoned her.
“It is now nearly six months wasted and while the rest seems to be back to some sort of normality – you can go for a drink – but I can’t hold my mum’s hand. It’s disgusting and insulting.
“I won’t get my hair cut or eat out in case I get a phone call from test and trace and ruin my chance of visiting my mum.
“My mum moved into permanent care home on June 3, then broke her hip and requires to have it operated on.
“She’s scared and needs me. All she keeps saying to me is, I wish I was dead, I cant take this any more.’ It is tearing me apart.”
Elderly and dementia charities have warned about the lasting impact of curbs on care home visits saying restrictions have left residents lonely, demoralised and losing the will to live.
Mrs Watson said she has written to NHS Lanarkshire urging the board to make tests available to relatives to allow visits to re-commence and said she had sent numerous emails to the First Minister and Health Secretary Jeane Freeman.
She added: “Please let us be tested, wear PPE and be in with our precious loved ones. If my mum passes away before that happens, I will not be able to live with myself.”
Scottish Labour’s Health and Social Care spokeswoman Monica Lennon backed her plea for testing to be available to relatives and carers.
She said: “Whilst folk are returning to gyms, pubs and restaurants, people living in care homes seem to be ‘out of sight and out of mind’ and their rights and freedoms have been lost.
“Expanding designated care home visits and making testing and PPE available to family carers must be implemented urgently.”
Gabe Docherty, NHS Lanarkshire’s director of public health, said: “I am acutely aware that the current situation will cause anxiety and disappointment among care home residents and their loved ones and I fully sympathise with them.
“We must, however, ensure that we do everything we can to protect care home residents, staff and their families.
“We would strongly encourage anyone who is finding the current Covid-19 situation mentally distressing or challenging to contact either their GP, seek information from www. nhsinform.scot or call the Scottish Government’s Covid advice line on 0800 028 2816.”