Thursday 22 June 2017

Stepping Out part 7

After an unexplained two week absence my latest appointment lasted all of about five minutes. He hadn't had the opportunity to speak to my GP, not sure how or why but there you go. This is apparently going to happen next week after which, at some random time, he will contact me. This will be a waste of time since nothing will come of this. Why, because he is the person who's supposed to be helping me according to the service the GP referred me to.

An absolutely spot on example of this came when he finished by telling me he had an idea of how I could obtain a bus pass. Remember, this is something he agreed I should have access to (important point). He had discovered another patient, with similar issues, had been referred to another social enterprise called Alliance Housing. I don't know much about them, but they do much the same thing as he does and the rest of these groups.

You might think, ok fair enough; give them a call. That's fine and I did (six week waiting list for an assessment notwithstanding). But the real issue is this: if he supports the idea of me having a bus pass, why can't he or his organisation sign off on one? I have no idea if Alliance Housing have the authority to do this. I'm sceptical since the application form asks specifically about being a patient of the actual mental health service, not just any group. Sure it's worth a try, but I doubt you can just talk to Alliance and ask for them to do this, obviously you'd have to be assessed and then develop a relationship for them to feel ok about doing this. It still doesn't address the question, and neither did he: why can't he sign off on this? Why am I being fobbed off like this? His reason was that "it wouldn't be right" because their service is short term only.

No it makes no sense to me either. Alliance Housing aren't going to be offering lifelong support, no one is.

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