Ms B complained that while her father, Mr A, was in hospital and approaching the end of his life, the Health Board failed to take timely and appropriate action to progress Mr A’s application for Continuing Health Care (“CHC”) funding and facilitate his discharge from hospital.
We found that the Health Board failed to arrange a full CHC assessment for Mr A on receipt of a completed checklist application for CHC funding. Instead, it repeatedly asked for more information which frustrated the team caring for Mr A, and his family. The Health Board also failed to consider whether it should have provided Mr A with alternative care immediately, in order to safeguard his wellbeing. Meanwhile, Mr A remained on a general ward in hospital, which was inadequate to meet his needs and appeared to have contributed to his clinical decline. Ms B’s complaints were therefore upheld.
We also found a suggestion that the Health Board routinely rejects checklist applications and identified that it did not have a robust process in place to receive and progress fast track CHC applications. We considered that these issues may indicate a systemic approach that is contrary to the law and guidance on how CHC applications should be received and processed.
The Health Board agreed to apologise to Ms B, review all current CHC applications to identify any who need fast track provision and to remind all CHC staff of the importance or recognising and correctly progressing checklist and fast track applications. The Health Board also agreed to draw up clear robust processes and requirements for checklist and fast track applications, implement them into use and share them with relevant other bodies for them to follow.