Tag Archives: ukcuts

Cash boost for cancer patients

April 17, 2013   Cancer, Carers, ukcuts

CANCER patients have unlocked £850,000 in unclaimed benefits over the past year thanks to advice from Maggie’s Nottingham.

By Lynette Pinchess

 

The free service at the specialist cancer support centre helped to ease money worries of people, some terminally ill, who find it hard to cope.

  1. Advice: Benefits adviser Chris Bissett talks to former cancer patient and Maggie’s volunteer Anne Singh at the Maggie’s cancer support centre at the City Hospital.

Last year nearly 1,000 people sought information from Maggie’s about entitlements, making benefits advice one of the services most in demand at the centre in the City Hospital grounds, where emotional, practical and psychological support is provided.

Cancer patients list money worries as a main concern, second only to major pain, and it is only once they have been helped to put their finances in order that they can focus on treatment.

The vital support is likely to be more crucial than ever in the year ahead due to benefit cuts, such as the new bedroom tax, which started this month.

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New PIP report form for GPs

April 12, 2013   benefits, Carers, health, ukcuts

GPs to be paid £33 per patient to assess eligibility for new disability benefit

12 April 2013 | By Madlen Davies

GPs will be paid £33 to fill out a new form determining whether patients are eligible for the Government’s new personal independence payment (PIP), a scheme the GPC has warned may ‘harass’ patients with a health condition or disability.

The PIP replaced the disability living allowance this week and GPs will be required to give details of the diagnosis, history, variability, treatment and the impact of the condition on the patients’ life, for which they will be paid £33.50 per form.

But the GPC has voiced concern that patients with long term conditions might be periodically ‘harrassed’ under the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) under the new PIP assessment.

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Carer raises fears over changes to social care funding

April 12, 2013   Carers, Older care, ukcuts

 

Skipton carer raises fears over changes to social care funding

7:00am Friday 12th April 2013 in News  By Matt Cornish, Editor

A Craven carer has met with a Government minister to discuss changes in adult social care funding.

From April 2016, the Government is intending to place a £72,000 cap upon what any individual has to pay for their social care costs.

But Tim Quelch, a Skipton carer, believes that the proposed changes could divert precious resources away from poorer social care users, placing extra financial pressure on unpaid carers – spouses, partners, families and friends.

The Government’s plan follows pressure from families whose loved ones have been forced to sell their homes to pay for their care costs, typically when they are admitted to care homes in later life.

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