Carer missed out on vital help when wife was ill because he's not online

FOR around a decade, Terry Lemington cared for his sick wife Annie at home, never knowing he could have accessed help that would have drastically made both their lives easier.

- LUCY JOHN Reporter [e-mail]

Terry with his late wife Annie.

Annie was just 10 weeks from her death and the assistance he had finally arranged was due to be installed the very day she died.

Like many older people in Wales and across the UK, limited access to the internet left 72-year-old Terry cut off from information and services he was entitled to.

Speaking to the Post, Terry is calling for change, to ensure there is inclusive access to services and information for the digitally excluded.

“I felt, and I still feel now, that if you are a carer or old, you are treated as a third-class citizen,” he said.

Describing how having knowledge of that vital support could have improved life for him and Annie, Terry said: “Annie would have been 83 when she became ill.

“She had 27 hotspots of arthritis down her spine, she had a knee replacement, she had diabetes which was food-controlled and she had a heart condition. Towards the end of her life she had 10% eyesight in one eye and nothing in the other”

Terry, who lives in Alltwen, Swansea Valley, explained that he had been receiving Carer’s Allowance from the Department of Work and Pensions, but that he had never been told that he was also eligible for a free stairlift and two hours of rest each day which would be covered by carers coming into the home.

“The first time we knew [was because] Annie had a fall 10 weeks before she died and was in hospital for a week,” he explained.

“District nurses were coming [into the home] to dress the wound because I was told by the consultant that I couldn’t do it because they wanted to check it wasn’t going septic.

“The senior nurse came and signed bits of paper for Annie's care. She asked me: ‘Where's your health plan?’

“To which Annie and I both laughed. And she said: ‘No seriously, where is your health plan?’ I said: ‘I don’t have one.