Mandy sorts the wheelchair woes

I have some catching up to do to bring you all up to date.

First of all and for the record let me state that Mandy Garnett, the Branch Contact at the MNDA West London and Middlesex Branch is a wonder. Roch and I just had to admit defeat as regards the elusive riser/recliner chair and the new wheelchair.  There was no sign of either. We rather naively thought we could deal with the delays ourselves. Over the last bank holiday weekend we gave up – earlier in the week our OT had copied me into an email thread with a rep at Wilcare Wales, in which she told him that it was now becoming embarrassing  for her as the client’s wife (me!) was in touch with her every day. In his reply he promised he would look into it, and a week later we still had no recliner chair.  The OT agreed with me – it was time to let Mandy sort them out. The ‘new’ wheelchair had been taken away by Serco (again) but there was a deafening silence there, too.  As I was tired of pointing out to people, it meant that Roch had nowhere to sit in the house except in his old electric chair, not ideal to sit in all day long. It has no tilt forward to help him stand up or tilt backward so that he could lie back with his feet up to help their circulation and give him a chance to relax – no headrest either.

Well, thanks to Mandy, within two days we had the recliner and wow what a difference it makes! Roch can now sit comfortably in a proper chair, has actually been known to doze off in it, and with his feet up again, the awful frozen feet syndrome is lessened. Best of all, it can raise him up almost to a standing position.

At last! The new riser/recliner arrives.

 Next she turned her attention to the wheelchair fiasco. Lo and behold, she discovered that the original chair had been returned stock. So why lumber Roch with a wheelchair that hadn’t worked for someone else? I am not clear about where this chair originated, or who gave the authorisation for it to be farmed out to an unsuspecting wheelchair user. This so called super -duper chair was delivered on Tuesday 9^th April. Since then, Serco came to fix it in situ four times, took it away twice and it broke down on two occasions on the High Street and once in the back garden.

On Sunday 2^nd June, following Mandy’s investigations, a new working chair with a head rest and tilt function was provided through the MND Association. 

People with MND can’t wait around for equipment. They just don’t have the time.  What is so difficult to understand about that?

More good news. We have a date for delivery for the new car and my replacement counterpart driving licence arrived today. So come 19^th June, we are completely mobile again and no longer have to rely on taxis to get around. (Sounds of cheering and applause…)

Snooze time