NHS accused of more anti-age discrimination

Hundreds of thousands of elderly people are being denied basic access to medical treatment simply because they live in care homes, a report warns.

Health service executives and residential home managers are failing to ensure that elderly patients are seen by GPs, receive the therapy, out-of-hours care and specialist dementia treatments that they need, it said.

Doctors often simply tell staff that residents should go to straight to hospital, while some state-funded medics are reluctant to help privately-run care homes for ideological reasons, the report suggested.

Eh? We pay them to provide a service. Why do they feel entitled to foist their ideologies on us?

The British Geriatrics Society, which conducted the inquiry, condemned the “betrayal” of elderly residents by an NHS that is “ageist” and treats patients in care homes as a “low priority”.

The report called on ministers to set clear national rules for doctors and hospitals on the services they must provide to care home residents.

The findings follow a series of highly critical reports from health inspectors at the Care Quality Commission into the neglect of the elderly in NHS hospitals. The watchdog found problems at a quarter of hospitals inspected, with dehydrated elderly patients being prescribed water and others left without being fed.

There are an estimated 400,000 older people in British care homes.

The report said: “Healthcare for residents remains a ‘Cinderella’ service in the NHS. This is a betrayal of older people, an infringement of their human rights and is unacceptable in a civilised society.”

The study found that there were “unacceptable” variations in the health services provided to residents from one home to the next, while the quality of medical care provided by the NHS was “often poor”.

The report blamed a range of factors for the breakdown in health services for elderly care home residents. These included “ageism”, a failure by health executives to prioritise services for care homes, and cuts to funding for NHS services for care home residents.

The report also warned that too many medics still believe in the “myth” that private care homes are making large profits out of their residents and want to use the NHS “to avoid providing care and equipment they have been paid to provide”.

“This myth persists in tainting working relationships and affects residents’ access to health care,” the report said.