Community Care Magazine for Elderly and Disabled: GAZETTE No.52MARCH-APRIL 2007 Trousers That May Minimize A Fall. We were recently sent details of the following product and we thought we would pass on the information to our readers. HipSaver Activs Smart Long Pants are designed to "provide an effective protection from fall and impact related injuries." The company, Win Health Ltd make a range of similar clothing designed for protection and you can view these at their website www.winhealth.co.uk or telephone 01835 864866 for further details. At the present time there are in excess of 75,000 hip fractures in the UK annually and this number is expected to increase as the population ages. Holidays A company called Diana's Supported Holidays organises breaks, in the U.K. and abroad, for people with a learning disability. Their website advises that the package holiday includes "24 Hour Support." For further information why not visit their website: www.dianassupportedholidays.com Trevanion House Holidays, based in Wadebridge in Cornwall, provide "an exciting holiday experience, offering choice and promoting independence." The brochure says "all of our staff are well qualified and fully understand the needs of adults with learning disabilities." Guests are taken all over Cornwall and for active guests swimming, bowling, walking and cycling can be arranged. There are also theme weeks, e.g. Ghastly Ghosts and Spooky Stories, Autumn Sunshine and Tinsel and Turkey. For a brochure call 01208 814903 or visit their website: www.trevanion.co.uk London Congestion Charge Not all drivers have to pay the London Congestion Charge and there are a range of exemptions and discounts. If you are a Blue Badge Holder and you wish to travel to London, within the zone, you need to do the following to avoid charges. You need to register. You can download the application form from www.cclondon.com or telephone 0845 900 1234 and they will post an application form to you. Once you have the form you can fill in the details for either one or two vehicles. You will need to send a photocopy of both sides of your Blue Badge document. Return this with a "one off" £10.00 registration fee and your exemption should be granted. After this, you will need to renew annually, but you do not have to pay any additional cost. Relatively Speaking... ...is the name of a newly published book written to help the long distance carer. The book has been written by a lady who is caring for an elderly relative from a distance. The author gives details from her own experience which she hopes will benefit other carers in the same situation. Focus is given to the practical aspects of the caring from working with the statutory bodies, health and safety issues, insurance, setting up a bank account as a long distance carer, dealing with tax returns, etc. For further information you can contact the author Gillian Kemp by email at freshwater.bay@ntlworld.com or by telephoning 01707 267540. The book costs £7.99 per copy. If you had Health or Disability Problems! Prior to the reign of Henry VIII, if you were sick or disabled you would, apart from your family and neighbours, rely on the religious organisations to provide care for you. Monks and Nuns orders built and ran the hospitals. For example the Bethlam Hospital (also known as Bedlam) was built in London in 1247 for people suffering from mental illness.When Henry VIII destroyed the monasteries, many of the hospitals were also destroyed or closed. The Poor Law Act of 1601 was introduced to help poor people, including the sick and disabled, who had no support. The Act made each parish responsible for such people who lived within their parish. One of the practical steps they took was to build parish workhouses to accommodate poor and sick people. A roof may have been over the heads of the residents but generally they were deemed to be grim places to live in. Each workhouse had an infirmary and a "medical" officer. Most of the care however, was given by other female residents, most of whom could not read instructions that were given concerning treatment and medicine. The infirmary conditions were poor; dreadful hygiene; basic toilets in the infirmary room; unpleasant smells and poor facilities. It was not until 1863 that the first workhouse had a trained nurse. In the 18th century wealthy benefactors began to fund the building and staffing of hospitals and institutions for disabled people in London. In 1700 the only medical hospitals in London were the hospitals of St Bartholomew and St Thomas. There was also the Greenwich Hospital built to care for sailors and refugees and the Magdalen Hospital founded to rescue penitent prostitutes. Hospital buildings continued to be built throughout the 19th century and the idea spread to other cities and towns. Many of these hospitals are still in use today as NHS hospitals. Hot Cross Buns One theory of how the Hot Cross Bun originated is that the word "bun" comes from the Saxon word for "sacred ox" and at the feast of Eastre an ox was sacrificed and the image of the horns carved into ritual bread. This evolved into the twice scored shape we now are more familiar with on our modern day Hot Cross Buns. Other theories are that the "cross" represents the four phases of the moon and Christian missionaries are said to have served buns with crosses on them as a marketing tool to encourage pagans into the idea of Christianity. Many tales have grown up around the bun such as the idea that if you kept a bun from one Good Friday to the next, you would be lucky. The buns were supposed to guard against shipwreck and if you chose to hang a bun over your chimney breast, then all your bread baked there would be perfect. Supermarket Shopping Shopping in a supermarket if you are elderly or disabled can be a daunting prospect. The perception of getting in other people's way, not being quick enough in selecting items from the shelf or feeling overawed by the whole experience means many people do not venture inside a supermarket. However some supermarket chains have made great efforts to make supermarket shopping a more confident and user friendly experience for older and disabled people. Morrisons Supermarket for example offer the following facilities for shoppers with disabilities:
Restaurant Food Many restaurants are now using locally sourced products and are more than happy to tell you where their meat and vegetables come from. In a restaurant local to this office, whenever a meal is served, a list of where all the ingredients were sourced is on the table and where and at what time you could contact the supplier/farmer/deli should you want to make further purchases from them. The Newsflash Every Thursday Able Community Care publishes a "Newsflash" which is a free, weekly care information/news service, delivered to your computer by email. It contains information on such topics as the latest nursing home and residential care home news, domiciliary care news, facts and figures re carer's pay, costs of care, relevant legislation/directives and statistics concerning elderly and disabled people. A simple way to keep up to date in the care field. If you would like to receive a copy every Thursday morning, please subscribe using any of the subscribe boxes on this website. Interesting Facts There are over 99,000 hairdressers working in the UK. In 2007 there are more pensioners than children in the UK. The Children's Society Last edition we mentioned that one of our Carers, Jack Hays, is running in the London Marathon to raise money for The Children's Society and its projects. To those readers who sent cheques to us, thank you, and we have forwarded them on to Jack. If any other readers would still like to contribute, please send cheques directly to us made out to The Children's Society and we will forward them to him. Meals on Wheels Meals on Wheels have been synonymous with the WRVS for many years and they continue to operate in most parts of the UK. However there are an increasing number of independent companies who are beginning to provide meal deliveries to older and disabled people. Some are local companies delivering to a relatively small area while others are able to provide their meals on a nationwide basis. Two companies who do this are:
You do not have to sign up for a regular food delivery, so both companies make it very easy to buy a "number of meals delivery" as a gift for someone to give them a treat or help them over a period of illness, etc. Wheelchair Fencing Wheelchair fencing was introduced by a doctor at Stoke Mandeville Hospital as a therapy for men injured in the Second World War. The wheelchair fencing activity was extremely popular and was the catalyst to the beginning of the Paralympic Games for disabled athletes. Client Surveys Over the past few weeks we have carried out our regular survey about how clients feel about our service provision. (Indeed many of you may have returned forms to us and we thank you.) You can see the results in the Newsflash of January 11th 2007, by visiting the back issue page for Newsflash 49 They Said It! Margaret Thatcher: Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't. Mark Twain: When I was a boy of fourteen my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished by how much he'd learned in seven years. Zsa Zsa Gabor: I call everyone 'Darling' because I can't remember their names. Finally, if you don't already receive a free, regular copy of this gazette, and would like to, please call us on 01603 764567 to sign up for your own copies in the future.
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