23 March 2012
Continuing the saga of the pressure cushion, about which I wrote yesterday, I rang the manufacturers but they were not a great deal of help. They didn’t seem to think it was necessary to adjust the pressure in the cushion, despite the weight loss, although they did appreciate that a cushion in the wheelchair could be different from the one in the lounger, because the base, on which the cushion sits, would be different in each case. I really would have thought that the manufacturers selling this special cushion at around £240 would have been more helpful concerning setting it up .
I then rang the MND helpline (0845) 762 6262, but, polite and kind as they were, they were no more help. I then tried my local representative who suggested I rang the MND helpline, but when I told him that I had already done so and they didn’t seem to know the answer, he said that I should insist on being put through to the equipment side. Fearful of upsetting my district nurse I decided against that course of action. My final call was to the suppliers of the chair only to be told that the I rang only to be told that they had lost the contract and it was now dealt with by the Essex Social Services. As I am unable to write and could not note the telephone number, he very kindly took the knows I’m a number and said he would get them to ring me. Pretty decent I thought considering they had lost the contract. I will persevere on this matter and let my readers know the outcome as there must be many other patients with the same problem.
A number of my readers might wonder why I am making such a fuss about this business. I can only say that unless you have been in the same position as I am, totally unable to shift your weight, after 10 or 11 hours in the same position it can become very uncomfortable on your bottom. This, even though I get hoisted out of the chair at midday and six o’clock, for a few moments, to relieve the pressure and perhaps have some, Conotrane massaged onto my bottom.
Almost to a man, today’s front pages of our national newspapers focused on the treatment of pensioners in yesterday’s budget. Quite simply the Chancellor decided to freeze the threshold above which pensioners would pay income tax. whereas he raised this threshold for other categories of taxpayer. This coupled with the reduction from 50 to 45p. in the pound for persons earning over £200,000 p.a. and a reduction in corporation tax, was manerr from heaven for the tabloid press. To As one politician put it, as Chancellor was like a Robin Hood but instead of robbing the rich to help the poor, he had done it the other way round, robbed the poor to pay the rich..
Not true, but with a great number of pensioners unable to understand how the tax was worked out it was not difficult to make ‘the man on the Clapham omnibus ‘ believe that this was the case.. In fact, no pensioner is one penny worse off it is only that they expected the threshold to rise and as it didn’t people are claiming that the pensioners are worse off by the amount they anticipated they would have been and the threshold being raised as expected.!
Having heard a number of old-age pensioners interviewed in the street, on this matter, I am convinced that most of them have no idea what the fuss is all about except that they had been told they are worse off and believed that to be so. Unfortunately a preponderance of old-age pensioners are probably conservative voters and this perfectly sensible move by the Chancellor at this time of credit squeeze will certainly have lost them a few votes, conveniently forgetting that it was a Labour Party who left the country virtually bankrupt. However, people’s memories are short and hopefully within 2 to 3 years, when the next election takes place, things will look a bit rosier.
You’ve probably heard the expression, the grass always looks greeneron the other side of the fence,. This can be particularly so in auster times, such as we are suffering from at present Click here for an object lesson in being thankful for what you got now.