Were you given any information in hospital about sort of social security, if you needed help at home, that sort of thing?
Yes, we were, and the problem here is that you have all this information coming in, and to actually take it all and deal with it is very difficult, so I think although I'm sure we were given, I actually had a conversation with somebody about this, and it is there, they give you a booklet, or several booklets about different things and so forth and so on about benefits and so on and so forth, but I just don't think you take that kind of information in.
It's later when you start to need it more, but then of course it's too late because it's very difficult if, if you have surgery and you go through all of this stuff, may be a month, two months down the line you suddenly realise that, ah hang on a moment I should be doing this or that and that and this, any claim for any benefit will start form that point onwards, whereas you should really be hooked into that system from the day of your diagnosis.
And for me I think I would like to see that, I would like to see someone say, "Okay, irrespective of your situation, we'll book you into a set of benefits now and we can take you off them later if they're not applicable." But if you don't claim for them then, you're not entitled to them, and as a lung cancer patient you could be dead before that happens, so you wouldn't even have access to any benefits for a partner for instance so that all then becomes really difficult, you wouldn't be entitled to certain benefits towards funeral costs for instance, and so forth and so on.
You have to do this, it's not made clear to you and if somebody gives you a booklet that says "Right here's all the things you can claim for”, that's great so you know what you can claim for, whether or not you can actually get that benefit is another thing altogether. We claimed for two or three benefits before I was actually told which one I should be claiming for only to be refused those three benefits having filled out this huge information pack of you know what's this, what's that, all the rest of it. And then they just write back and say, "Oh you're not entitled to that benefit because you haven't done this," or whatever, "You don't qualify for that because you're not within this criteria or whatever." They don't tell you what you can't do until you actually claim for it. It's a really weird system and it must cost millions whereas if there was somebody there who says, "Okay this is your circumstances, this is what you need to claim for," and that should be it.
There should be specialist advisors and I've been told that there are, however I wasn't able to access them so it obviously needs addressing. |
