Continuation of healthcare payments that are too difficult to obtain | Letter

This is not just happening in support for children with special educational needs and disabilities (£100 million spent in England on failed attempts to block Send support for children, December 22). If you are severely physically and/or mentally disabled and therefore require 24-hour care, you are highly eligible for Continuing Healthcare Payments (CHC), with the NHS covering all healthcare costs.

It seems like almost no one ever hears about this without a lot of digging and searching. It is rare for someone to be pointed in the right direction by professionals. The hoops you have to jump through and the bureaucratic roadblocks are enormous. There are law firms that specialize exclusively in obtaining CHC payments. I am currently using a company to get CHC for my 91 year old mother. She has mixed dementia, is bedridden and requires 24 hour care. At no time did any professional mention CHC to me. The chances that I will be successful without the legal help are minimal – and I am a retired doctor!

I’m surprised that the company I use employs 80 people – mostly attorneys, paralegals, and barristers. It occurs to me that every time they are successful, that person deserved the payment in the first place, so why is it like trying to get blood from a stone? I can’t help but feel that the system is deliberately set up to set people up for failure, which seems particularly cruel because you’re dealing with a very vulnerable and sick demographic, not to mention their caregivers. Another case of pursuing soft objectives rather than chasing revenue from tax-dodging multinationals.
Dr. Michael Duxbury
Leicester