WCS - Personalised Budget Meeting Dept of Health

[Burgerman]

At the moment Personal Health Budgets do not include powerchairs or wheelchair services so you need to get your WCS to do a pilot scheme.

[popschief]

There's hope for the cause of common sense. This means you've struck a blow for the dire need to improve our lot by providing modern, up to date equipment that in some way approaches the level of the technology available today. When this money flows directly to those who apply it in their own best interests the industry will not be receiving it for the outdated inadequate junk they've been forcing on us. If enough cash flows away from them they will sit up and take notice and begin to design better equipment. Thanks so much John. We owe you big time and I'm thinking of starting a donation effort for you (redeemable only at your favorite pub for beer of course).
Cheers, popschief.

[Burgerman]

Well maybe, but most chairs are really designed for the US market. Their budgets and choice has just been reduced... Slower chairs, indoor only.

So god knows what will happen.

And of course they have to assess you still to decide which chair they *would* have given you to base your budget on. And I am not sure how that will eventually work. But it does mean that the voucher with its restrictions on supplier and chairs will be a gonner!

[Martin O Refurbisher]

BM,
Thanks for the pointer. I'll discuss my response with you before action, once I get a reply.

Best,

Martin

[popschief]

Yes, god only knows. The market is driven by insurance and government and users in that order. Just like hospitals run on their schedule not the patients (you poop when it's convenient for them). I'm not looking for any handouts but it would be nice to have an off the shelf chair that would go out in the back 40 without breaking down or getting stuck. We just bought a PEV 2000 and I've been pruning it down to size. It already fits all through the house. Man what a belt driven beast. It's made for up to 750 pounders. If it didn't hang on the ridiculously low tip wheels it would go anywhere. With an acre to keep clean I'll be pulling the 30 gallon weed sprayer around soon.
Cheers, popschief.

[Martin O Refurbisher]

Popschief

What do you mean by the "back 40" please?

Best,

Martin

[popschief]

Sorry for the colloquialism. The "back 40" means the back lot. It's not uncommon here to have 40 acres out back of the house to care for.

[Martin O Refurbisher]

Ah! Now I understand! Thanks.

Best,

Martin

[Burgerman]

I have about 40 feet! And its already too much trouble.

[ex-Gooserider]

Way to go John, sounds like things are finally starting to go right for you... Hopefully you can get the rest of the UK to follow suit, and then maybe the US will learn from the example....

I don't have a "back 40", but we do have a large lot, and a lot of stuff I'd like to do with it...

I'd love to figure out a way to do things like run the lawn tractor, snowblower, and so on from the chair or some such... Right now we have neighbors that do for us, but I really don't like being dependent on them...

One option that was suggested on an Outdoor Power Equipment forum that I was on, was to get a particular model of John Deere tractor that had an optional snowblower attachment, and a "hydrostatic" transmission. This is a sort of automatic transmission that gives a continuously variable drive speed from a nominally constant engine speed. The idea was that this would be the easiest style lawn tractor to adapt to hand controls. Not sure how well it would work, but it's a possibility...

The problem potentially is that of getting TO the tractor after a storm... The house has an attached garage, but there are two level changes between the house and the garage, so currently the only way I can get between is to use the outside ramp from the front door to the driveway, and then go in via the front door... Presumably I could get some sort of small blower to clear the ramp, but that has it's own problems...

ex-Gooserider

[Martin O Refurbisher]

Depending upon how much power you need, and for how long, and the depth / weight of snow, you have of course a relatively speaking large rechargeable battery on the powerchair. This would be more than adequate to run one of the larger hand held rechargeable battery blower/vacs on the market. Not sure if it would have enough output for you though. I have one that is 12v c 125W, and its output is fantastic, but I've never tried it on snow.

Best,

Martin

[Burgerman]

I use a 2HP 4 stroke blower for clearing snow, leaves, dusting the house of dog hairs, spiders (daily), clearing water from my polished van(!) and even blowing dust out of my PC. Dog hates it.

As for your tractor etc why not convert to RC? Modern systems are interference free and shut down and stop on loss of signal etc.

[Martin O Refurbisher]

My last email regarding personal budgets has been ignored so far.

I have therefore used the enquiry form to submit this:

I wish to apply for social care needs by self-directed support with a personal budget by direct payments. How do I go about this please?

Note that the key phrases underlined have been taken directly from their literature.

I sent it via the contact form found from:

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/disabledpeo ... g_10016128

Let's see if this produces a response.

I am now preparing my personal list what I can't do, here is the starter, e.g.

- My right wrist is not strong enough to lift even a cup of tea without severe pain. Therefore,
- I can't make a bed; someone else has to do it for me,
- when my bath lift fails, as it often does, I cannot get out of the bath unaided,
- Having only one good hand, I can't safely lift a meal into or out of the microwave, so I can't prepare hot food,
- My oven is at too low a height for me to reach, so I can't prepare hot food,
- My shortish arms and limited torso movement mean that I cannot adequately reach to perform proper personal care;
- I cannot do up trousers without aids,
- I am not strong enough to open / close the fire doors giving access to the building in which my flat is located, without assistance, either of my powerchair, or another person;
I sometimes cannot get out of bed without using a patient lift,

There are many more to add, but I welcome all comments

Best,

Martin

[Burgerman]

That should do for now. But you will be asked how you manage now. And this is for direct payments for care. Not personal budgets? Be careful because they are two different things.

[Martin O Refurbisher]

BM, very good points.

I manage now ,because, like you, I am stubborn and will never give up.

You have raised an interesting point - are there two separate funds?

Best,

Martin

[Burgerman]

Theres 3...

There is the new "Personal Care Budget". (Which may now be extended soon to including powerchairs you build for yourself!)

And there is direct payments for care. This is what I do now. Includes social enganements, and personal care but not cleaning, etc. If I take the first one I lose this one. One or the other.

And then theres the ILF which tops up these when they assess you need more money than their top amount... Simple? Er no!

[Martin O Refurbisher]

Wow!

I currently get the high rate of DLA for Mobility but only the middle rate for care. Time to upgrade, I think!

re ILF

from the website:
""
The ILF is permanently closed to new applications.

To continue to get funding from the ILF, in the majority of cases customers must:

get social services support worth at least £340 a week or £17,680 a year. This can include direct payments or services from your local council, like going to a day centre
be living in the UK for at least 26 weeks a year
have less than £23,000 in savings or capital. This includes any money their partner has, if they have a partner
get or be entitled to the highest rate care component of Disability Living Allowance
""
Best,

Martin

[ex-Gooserider]

Depending upon how much power you need, and for how long, and the depth / weight of snow, you have of course a relatively speaking large rechargeable battery on the powerchair. This would be more than adequate to run one of the larger hand held rechargeable battery blower/vacs on the market. Not sure if it would have enough output for you though. I have one that is 12v c 125W, and its output is fantastic, but I've never tried it on snow.

Best,

Martin

If this is going to get very involved, probably ought to break it out into a different thread as it's WAY off the original topic... However the snow we get here in Mass. is not the sort of thing that a chair or leaf blower would even touch... A light storm is 2-3" which isn't to bad, unless it's a snow and ice / rain mix, in which case it's about the consistency and weight of wet concrete... Heavier storms can be 18-24" or more... Before I was injured I had two snowblowers, the first was a Toro, 7hp 4stroke motor with a 26" wide path. It was getting tired, and rather unreliable, so I replaced it with an Ariens 10 hp machine with a 30" cut width - although a lot of storms you have to overlap the passes by 30-50% in order to get a clean surface. These were both "two-stage" machines with a fairly slow turning horizontal screw / auger that pulled the snow in and back to a smaller much faster turning impeller that throws the snow up and out a directional chute. They are self-propelled, with speeds ranging from very slow walk to reasonably brisk. In a heavy storm, even the slow speed can be to much, requiring lots of pauses to let the machine clean itself out. We have a very big driveway, probably on the order of 75-100' long and 2-3 cars wide for the main drive, plus a turn-around strip that is several times longer, but only half the width, plus I had to clear out around our wood sheds, and the path to my tin storage shed... A light storm would usually take me an hour or two, a heavy one 3-4 hours to do the job...

The tractor we have is only good for cutting the grass, far as I know it doesn't even have a snowblower attachment as an option, and it's rather clunky to drive as shifting requires coming to a complete stop using the combined clutch / brake pedal before changing gears. It might be possible to do an RC control on the pedal, but it would take a lot of power to work it. I would rather see us get a tractor with a "hydro" transmission as that would be much simpler to adapt the controls. I don't see an easy way to do RC on the snow blower, as it is designed to have a person walking behind it both to balance the unit and to steer it (which is mostly brute force "horsing" it around - no differential on the drive wheels, plus the scraper on the front auger....)

They do make small gas or 110V AC electric blowers, but they are very light duty, and tend to not work very well on anything other than fairly small falls of light and fluffy snow. They might be enough to get my ramp cleared and to the garage door, but the biggest problem I'd have with one of those is how to keep it up at the top of the ramp where I'd need it to get out of the house...

ex-Gooserider

[Burgerman]

Get yourself a small APU gas turbine. Turn it into a pure turbojet by stripping off the power take off secondry turbine. The sheer volume and quantity of heat that comes from the rear end will shift any snow or ice.

Mine weighs about 16lb and used to make 72 shaft hp. And now makes about 72hp worth of heat, and blast... Only about 100lb of static thrust, but vast quantities of ear splitting blast noise, and heat! Would clear a runway.

They appear in miliatary surplus sales, ebay periodically, etc. Mount one aimed down at 30 degrees on an old rc wheelchair... Have fun with the neigbors! Also clears leaves, and can strip paint, burn down sheds etc... There wont be any dust, gravel or any thing growing in your yard either though.

And you think I am kidding? A 72hp blower with a 670 degrees C exhaust makes a really good blower. And they look so innofensive too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1lya-SU_0Q This guy has one of my solent gas turbine "starters" in a kart. Here it is being tested. Its mounted sideways.

This is the engine on my transfer board. http://www.burgerman.info/jetpics/SOLENTUP.jpg

Hvent quite figured out what to do with it though. Too big for model planes, too thirsty for very much! Drinks about half a gallon every 60 secs...

[Martin O Refurbisher]

BM

I got this reply by email today.


Re your e mail for self directed support and the process,
You will need to contact our Duty desk, and complete an initial assessment over the phone, if you meet our criteria and it is assessed that support is required a Social Worker will contact you and arrange a visit.

Originator signs as "Assistant Care Manager"

What do you suggest I say please?

Best,

Martin