Once there was Social Security, now there’s the Tories and their DWP (Pt.1)

From the archive: Reposted due to the crippling impact now of mortgage interest rate payments, energy costs, inflation etc. I realised there must be many disabled people like myself with a similar, depressing and scary predicament. We ‘were’ just about managing … but not now

I thought I’d write about my experiences with the DWP since turning to them for some help in 2012. I will start with a letter I wrote to my GP and others some 13 or so months later in 2013 …

A letter to; My Doctor. My MP. The DWP. The Courts Tribunal Service.

Over a year ago, mid August 2012 after several months of ever increasing pain & reduced ability to work I eventually booked an appointment with my GP. This was the first time I had seen my GP since 2004. Being self-employed, I had soldiered on with my aches & pains for 13 years since spinal surgery in 2000. In fact 33 years since 1979 when I had a rather nasty Road Traffic Accident that started all my long term skeletal problems. 

My GP was great and agreed to get me to specialists for advice on any possible treatment for my long term ankle and more urgently, back pain. 

Meanwhile being self-employed with no sick pay and a young family, mortgage & all the associated bills thereof, I contacted the DWP. It seemed there was something called ESA. An advisor at the JobCentre told me via telephone that this would be an entitlement given my contributions to National Insurance, income tax etc since starting work at 16 in 1976. 

Despite the GP prescribed pain killers, my back pain worsened, my income trickled down to zero during the next couple of months & inevitably, my customers looked elsewhere. I was awarded ESA, contributions based at £42 per week. Not very much but every little helped. I had by now contacted my bank, credit card issuers, loan companies, mortgage company etc to inform/warn of my financial predicament as one is advised to do in such circumstances.

In November I was seen by a specialist regarding my long term ankle pain as a result of my 1979 accident. Luckily I have an orthopaedic splint made for me in 2003 by the Conquest Hospital via the then orthopaedic specialist, which along with the painkillers helps alleviate the pain. This made the updated diagnosis of traumatic arthritis of the damaged ankle a lower priority than my agonising & incapacitating back pain. I was placed on a list for some targeted pain killing injections in my ankle. Not a long term solution I felt but I went along with the consent.

In December I wrote to my GP asking for progress on the referral for my back problem. At the same time I was asked to attend an ATOS Work Capability Assessment (WCA) in Hastings. This I painfully attended under threat of losing my £40 odd pounds per week award. I was puzzled at not being asked to remove my surgical splint for the medical exam but then they are the experts, aren’t they? In January 2013 a letter arrived from the DWP, as a result of the WCA exam I had been placed in the Work Related Activity Group (WRAG) and would need to attend a meeting with a ‘disability adviser’ at my local Job Centre. This I duly attended (again under threat of loss of payment) and struggled up to the first floor (no lift) in much pain & discomfort only to be told that I was obviously unfit for any work. As this all seemed very illogical and with no sign of any appointment with a back specialist I asked that the DWP decision be looked at again and subsequently appealed against the decision.

February 2013 I receive a letter from ‘VirginCare‘.(Note: NHS Logo) With an appointment date to see an ‘Extended Practitioner’. 

This centre in Hastings I attend and am advised to have an MRI scan. This took place in Eastbourne later that same month. At the follow up feedback appointment back in the Hastings Virgin Care centre I was told that I need to be referred back to the NHS to see a surgeon for severe damage to discs & nerve damage. 

By this time my business is now gone. My financial problems are much worse with CAB advising Bankruptcy as my only option. I have constant pain & discomfort. On a visit to my GP (to request the DWP demanding ‘sick note’) I discuss further pain relief & Neuropathic tablets to help with the constant sciatica & feet pain. My blood pressure is very high. I very reluctantly ask for help with moods having recognised a return of depression which I had been treated for in the late 1990’s. My GP is again very helpful and supportive in prescribing antidepressants & drugs for the blood pressure. 

July 2013. An appointment with a spinal surgeon at the Conquest Hospital. X-rays & exam. I consent to a spinal probe to establish disc damage. Further fixation surgery is mentioned. I expressed to the surgeon my fear of more spinal surgery as the surgery I had in 2000 seemed to have caused the permanent sciatica (in my ‘good’ leg). We agree to discuss this again after the probe.

As I write it is September 2013. No sign of an appointment for the probe. My mental health is deteriorating. I fear any surgery, even the probe. The pain is manageable with the assortment of pain killers I now have providing I do not do very much. And I do not do very much these days. I have watched, read & listened to the media destroying the reputation & integrity of the NHS. And I wonder if I will ever volunteer for any kind of surgical procedure. 

My business has collapsed. I am not fit for work according to the Job Centre. And despite the DWP saying I should be in the Work Related Activity Group, I have not had one invite for a consultation to discuss possible work options.

I conclude now that my stoic attitude to my pain is perhaps my undoing. In 1979 at age 18 I suffered major multiple open fractures to my right leg. Breaks to the knee, severed artery & muscle & badly dislocated ankle. This is like major surgery on the roadside without anaesthetic, fully conscious throughout. There followed months on traction, bone grafting surgery etc, etc. Only someone like myself who has experienced this could understand any of the above. 

I say this because my attitude in life since has been to soldier on. There are folk much worse off. Keep working & because of that experience of pain, my 1 – 10 pain scale sees ’10’ as that on the road, bones, flesh, protruding. That level of pain. 

But in August 2012 I tried to stop grinning and bearing it and ask for help. Both of the medical profession & the DWP. 

My GP has been fantastic & possibly saved my life. 

The DWP have been an incompetent nightmare and sole cause of my anxiety, stress and inevitable depression. The NHS specialists have been very good but I suspect they are frustrated by politics. And Virgin Care who have I bet presented their invoice!

I have tried to keep this brief. I cannot articulate face-to-face or via telephone my thoughts above unfortunately. I needed to get this off of my chest and out of my mind which is increasingly fragile. 

Thank you for reading.

Mr Baffled Ape

The text in italics above is a copy of a letter i wrote to my GP, MP, DWP, Tribunal Service

So, my lovely GP called me on the telephone to see if I was OK and promised to chase up my Spinal Probe surgery. My GP also explained the directive doctors have now to refer people via Virgin Care who then when they see a difficult (non profit I suspect) case refer you back to the NHS. Before Virgin Care the GP would refer you directly to the specialist. Great work Cameron & Hunt!

I received a reply from my MP the Conservative Greg Barker, who said he’d passed it onto his colleague Mr Iain Duncan Smith. I was almost overjoyed with excitement at the prospect of such a letter ¡¡ (inverted exclamation = universal sign for sarcasm)

Meanwhile a 2nd ATOS Work Capability Assessment appointment arrived, despite many phone calls to the Newcastle DWP office explaining  & reminding them of the pending appeal, I was told that I must attend or, you guessed, get sanctioned and lose my ESA award.

So, at this stage I was now 15 months on from asking the DWP for help. Despite paying income tax and having paid in the maximum contributions to National Insurance since starting work in 1976, I am having to fight every step to receive the ‘Social Security’ I am, according to the system entitled to!

End of Part 1 

Part 2 coming soon. The Tribunal, more surgeons etc.

Published on

9/22/14 10:45 AM