Disabled Ex-Nurse Faces Massive Home Care Cut

A disabled former nurse – unable to dial a phone, dress, feed or wash herself – is to have her council care slashed by more than half in November. Victoria Shanks (58), a resident of Inverness, who has multiple sclerosis (MS), is one of the first victims of Highland Council’s cuts in home care. Her package will be reduced from 147 hours a week to just 62.5 hours, taking away her carer who stays overnight. Friends of the former Raigmore Hospital nurse and midwife fear her health could be put at risk. While carers at Inverness’s MS therapy centre fear others could experience similar cuts and be forced into residential homes.

The reassessment comes as the council re-evaluates the cash spent on care packages due to a predicted £3 million overspend in the social work budget.

Even the council’s Homecare Services contractor, June Crawford, is concerned for Ms Shank’s safety. “I have been staying with her at nights and, God forgive, but if anything was to happen such as a fire, a burglary or even just slipping out of position in bed, there would be nothing she could do,” she said.

Wheelchair-bound Ms Shanks yesterday hit out at the council and said she would resist going into residential care because she prefers to live in her own home. “I am really very miffed,” she said. “All my working life I’ve been a nurse. I was a senior nurse and I always thought that when I needed care I would get it. Considering I helped care for people all my life, I think it’s very wrong to be denied the help when I need it,” she added.

Wheelchair bound for four years, her care reassessment came in February when she was informed she no longer fitted the criteria for 24hour care, despite her carer’s insistence there had been no change in her physical condition.

At first Ms Shanks was told her home care package would be cut from 24 hours daily, Monday to Saturday plus three hours on Sunday, to just six hours a day – 42 hours a week.

But after taking up the case with the Queen, several MPs, MSPs and councillors, the council did up the number to 62.5 hours a week.

Last month her council appeal against the decision was unsuccessful.

Thirty years after developing the neurological condition, the former nurse’s carers believe recent breakthroughs in her psychological condition could be reversed as a result of the 57 per cent cut. “Since she started receiving 24hour care over three years ago her improvement has been remarkable,” said Margaret Murie, manager of the MS therapy centre and friend for 15 years. I’ve known Victoria when she’s been alone at night before 24-hour care and it’s a miserable existence,” she added.

Gale Falconer, friend and director of the centre, has also had her respite care cut. “It has really saddened me that this has all happened to Victoria, she’s a valuable member of our group,” she said.
“Tony Blair has giving a speech this week on social inclusion – this is social exclusion, the exact opposite,” she added.

Married twice but now divorced, Ms Shanks’s closest relatives are her two daughters, Fiona (28) who lives in Aberdeen and Julia (26) in Newcastle, and a brother in Edinburgh. Despite being visited frequently by her family, she admitted the cut to her care could eventually force her from her home into residential care.

“I don’t want it. I’ve been in nursing homes before when my bathroom was being altered. It wasn’t me,” she said. “I’m worried that my family and friends will be worried. I’ve spent so many years trying not to worry my daughters, I wanted them to get on with their lives,” she added.

Highland Councillor Jimmy MacDonald (Scorguie), Inverness area social work and housing committee chairman, was one of the first to flag up every care package would be reviewed. “There is definitely going to be an impact on some people, every single case is being reassessed and in some cases we have found care packages costing £100,000 a year for one person,” he said. “Some very difficult decisions are going to be taken over the next year and it’s inevitable that this is going to happen in some areas,” he added.

However, a recent council budget report said more care should be provided in the home, a policy that contradicts Ms Shank’s experience. “People should be supported at home for longer; the balance of care had to shift to invest in home-based and community care,” the report stated.

A council spokeswomen said the local authority could not comment on individual cases.