"Upsetting experience"

When my mother had a series of strokes last year she was referred for rehabilitation with the physiotherapy team at Seaton Hospital.

Her previous experiences there were all excellent and she received kind and supportive help from the physiotherapists.

However, on her most recent visit, my mother - who struggles greatly with mobility- attended on her own (having used a taxi to get her there from her care home). On arrival she was directed to the waiting room. After 20 mins she had to walk to the physio department and the physiotherapist  pointed to a chair and told my mother to sit down.

They asked my mother what she expected of them. She replied that she hoped they would help her walk a little better. They said that since my mother had attended previously she should have a record of the exercises she should be doing and therefore there was nothing they could do to help her. This was after she had been in hospital twice in a month having suffered strokes.

My mother then asked them whether there might be any chance of a new drug or treatment coming out in the next year or two that might help her knee. Their response was to aggressively say what, at your age? No!

My mother then paraphrased, in other words, you can’t do anything to help? And they replied, they were going to discharge her but what she should do morning and night is sit on a chair without arms and get up and down 10 times without any help. (My mother has not been able to do this, due to pain and osteoarthritis for at least 20 years!)

And with that they didn’t help my mum out of the chair but told her to leave. All of this without even looking at my mother’s knee or checking her brace.

And with that they left my mother to make her way out slowly out the building. My mother was terribly upset and traumatised by the whole experience.