Much is said of what is wrong with the NHS and the care sector, how it needs more money, how it will all be fine if taxes are raised etc etc.
I've been a hands on carer for the past year, looking after my partner, Viv,  who was misdiagnosed by Bedford Hospital and was returned home in March 2017 bedbound. I've been looking after her rehab, pressing the various NHS organisations for answers and second opinions, and doing everything at home 24 by 7 ever since.
I'm going to use this blog to report my day to day experiences of caring; far too much is said by politicians and workers in the sector, and too little heard from those suffering at their expense.
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I've just called the care agency to cancel this coming Thursday's care call; we have just one a day now (it was four when Viv first came out of hospital). We have to pay for care; we'd been careful and had savings over the £23K limit. If I give more than 24hr notice to the care agency we don't have to pay for the call - although I keep a separate record, for invoices from the care agency often include charges for calls I've cancelled. What incentive is there for those receiving free care calls to cancel them if they are not wanted, and what mechanism is there to see that the care agency does not invoice the council for them?
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The mail today included a letter from Bedford Hospital announcing Viv has a phone consultation with them in preparation for a minor op next Tuesday. The appointment is for 3.30 this afternoon. It's a good job the post was efficient; however, last week we were at Bedford Hospital and were told that a phone consultation would not be needed prior to the op. At 2.30 in the afternoon I had a call from the hospital to check whether she had had the pre op last week, it seemed as if they didn't know: apparently the computer records looked right but they weren't sure.
Imagine your bank phoning up and asking you whether you really did do the transactions you went into a branch to do the previous week... would it inspire confidence?
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 The minor op itself shouldn't be necessary. It's to correct a palsy arising from a Vestibular Schwannoma; Bedford Hospital found it in a scan in February 2015. However they didn't tell Viv or anyone about it until November 2016, by which time it was getting big enough to cause complications. I raised a formal complaint and was told, as if it was a routine matter, the appointments system has now been fixed. There's too much acceptance of failures in the NHS.