All
human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed
with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of
brotherhood.
Article 1 in the Universal Declaration for Human Rights
addresses the issue of dignity. But what is dignity for a spinal cord injured
person?
We estimate that around 25,000 people with spinal cord
injury receive some form of care or support to meet their health and social
care needs.
People with higher level spinal cord injuries often receive
24 hour care, seven days a week to help with day to day tasks as well as fulfil
medical needs. Having someone there to
turn you over in bed, to get you out of bed, provide bowel and bladder care is
very intrusive.
What helps is when people’s preferences are listened to. Often
these relationships can work well when people actively engage, interact and, as
strange as it sounds… be human.
A respondent to our care survey told us, “the carers
I have are fantastic, and I think of them as friends and equals. The social
services team my Council are brilliant and so are the rehab team at my hospital
who had the first contact with the social workers.”
Some on the other hand have a personal preference to have
their personal assistants come in, do the job and leave. Personal assistants,
district nurses and carers need to be mindful of the need to listen to the person
they are caring for.
Even when undergoing
assessments for disability benefits or social care provision assessors are seeking
minute details on people’s lives. Often this is beyond what is actually
relevant to the support being assessed for.
When it comes to
personalised social care, what people spend their direct payments on is heavily
monitored by some local authorities. Of course they have a duty to account for
money that they are spending on care packages, but some of systems for
reporting information are far too invasive and intrusive. Some local
authorities still insist on receiving paper copies of every penny people spend
with their direct payments, making the whole process bureaucratic and
burdensome at the same time.
People deserve the right to be treated with dignity and
local authorities and health commissioners need to be mindful of the feelings
of the person being cared for too when carrying their duties. Regular training
to care agency staff to instil a culture where the person’s wishes are always
at the forefront of staffs’ minds would go a long way to ensure people are
helped with greater dignity.
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