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A WOMAN WHO has been waiting for an operation to heal a chronic back problem for more than two years has been told that there are no guarantees when she will get her surgery.
Westmeath woman Catherina Tobin (54) has been in need of surgery for a chronic spinal complaint since at least June of 2015.
At that time she was diagnosed as needing decompression and fusion surgery of the L4 and L5 vertebrae in her back at north Dublin’s Beaumont Hospital. She was put on a waiting list for that surgery at the same time.
As things stand, she cannot move her left leg or toe. Her bottom is numb. She cannot sleep.
Catherina was told that she would have surgery within two months on 15 May this year. Now staff at the north Dublin hospital have informed her that they have no idea when a slot for her surgery will become available.
“I was back in Beaumont on the 17 July and I thought that was finally going to be it,” she tells TheJournal.ie.
Instead they checked my bladder and bowels for cauda equina (a condition caused by compression of the nerves in the lower spine), which I don’t have thanks be to goodness.
But that doesn’t change the fact I’m in chronic pain, and I have been for years, and we’ve known I need this operation for two years.
“Anyone can see the way I am, it’s excruciating and it’s constant. I know I may sound aggressive but the pain is constant, it’s just so unfair.”
No beds
Catherina has been told that there are no beds available to her consultant in the hospital due to them being occupied by tumour patients and also because of bed shortages at Beaumont as a result of privately insured patients taking public beds.
“How can I mind a tumour patient taking precedence, all I can do is feel so sorry for those people,” she says. “But I don’t see why the government has the right to discriminate against me for being a public patient, for not having insurance. I can’t get insurance because my condition is pre-existing.”
Beaumont Hospital declined to comment on Catherina’s situation, citing “patient confidentiality”.
As at end July, Beaumont had 25,742 outpatients on waiting lists, 2,847 (11%) of whom had been waiting for longer than 18 months, according to the National Treatment Purchase Fund’s (NTPF) official figures, representing a 3% increase in just one month.
“Now, when I ask they tell me the operation could be two months, six, a year,” says Catherina.
The last time I was up my son came with me. He was going to defer his college course to look after me until we talked him out of it. They asked him how my sleep was. He just laughed and said ‘my mother doesn’t sleep’.
“There are two types of patients in this government’s health system – those with money and those without,” says Sinn Féin TD Peadar Tóibín, who first brought Catherina’s case to light.
Both get treated very differently. The former get treatment, the latter don’t. This has a radical effect on their life outcomes. The withholding of treatment on income grounds as is the case with Catherina means extended periods of pain and discomfort are endured. It also removes low-income patients from the workforce which obviously has a knock on effect on income, accommodation and ability to provide for family.
Discs removed
Catherina first had a disc removed from her back when she was 19, followed by another when her son Alfie was born. She has struggled with her back complaint her entire adult life.
Now she has been told that she doesn’t qualify for immediate surgery under the NTPF as she has been waiting less than 18 months for surgery (with that date seemingly running from when her condition was deemed to be ‘chronic’ following a series of nerve tests in Beaumont in April 2016). This is an assertion she disputes.
“I was put down for this surgery in 2015, they say that’s not the case but they can’t tell me why. So they talk about me going back to the pain clinic. I already spent nine years there, we left there because there was literally nothing more they could do for me. We exhausted every option there. You needn’t think I’m doing that again. Yet if I had €17,000 I could have the operation tomorrow.”
“This is not an accidental crisis, it is the outcome of policy choice,” say Tóibín.
It’s nothing short of health care apartheid We need to treat all patients equally on the basis of need.
Catherina believes that under the HSE’s healthcare charter she should be entitled to have the surgery in another hospital which is capable of performing it, such as the Mater or Cappagh. This is an assertion that Beaumont declined to comment upon.
This isn’t what I want, I want to be back working, I’ve worked my whole life.
“Now I’ve no appetite, I can hardly walk, I’m sweating constantly, I can’t sleep. They’re giving me the kind of drugs you have to take in front of people because they’re so strong.
I have to do something, I can’t just allow myself to be discriminated against. I have to take a stand because people need to know what the real situation is. I can’t keep allowing this to happen.
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Hows that going to work. The child minder thats takes cash only and pays no tax ????
Should be done through tax, anyone working needs childminders in some shape or form.
(Through paye of the working parent/s) through the months of July and August it should be doubled.
many claim the dole too.
It would be more in Ms. Zappone’s line to explore ways to stop the corporations dodging their taxes instead of facilitating them as she did in the Apple case with the €19 billion outstanding. That sum would cover a generation of childcare for the country,
@Kieran Mcnamee:@Kieran Mcnamee: Voluntarily notifified childminders are qualified, Garda vetted, first aid trained, registered with the county council and tax compliant. Our child ratios are capped at a maximum of 3 and our income is capped at €15k. We are hardly millionaires! Yet unfortunately we have been excluded from this scheme. We would welcome inspections that are appropriate to a home environment rather than a creche…
If both parents of the children are in work full time, give them the tax credit of 900. Problem solved.
@anto curran. Why make something simple when you can make it very complicated. How else can these spoofers appear like they’re actually doing something.
Not really as you would only be saving / getting 190 quid a year, not 900 as it would be taxed at the 21%.
So increase that to 4K tax credit for each child under 15.
To be more exact (give or take a couple of euro) a tax credit of 4300 would be needed.
4300 taxed at 21% is 903 euro.
So a 900 tax credit isn’t worth much at all!!!!
@Anto Curran: I see no problem with it being there if only one parent is working too.
Lily, you’re confusing a tax allowance with a tax credit. A tax allowance works like you say. But a tax credit is a straight deduction from your tax bill, so 900 euros is worth 900 euros as long as you’ve paid at least 900 euros in tax.
Not everyone pays tax. My husband is on minimum wage and he has my tax free allowance. He hasn’t paid tax in years
And do you pay tax?
@Frank’s Cat: tax measures favour parents earning more. Students, people who were on the dole but got work towards the end of the tax year etc would not benefit.
Children are better off being looked after by a parent. Either parent.
Failing that a granny.
I don’t care what training or certificates a childminder has, a child is much better off in the security of their own home with their own family, accompanying granny for a walk or to the shops.
In a crèche with 15 other kids is never the answer. They simply won’t get the attention or stimulation.
I appreciate it’s difficult for most people but we need to redesign society and take a long hard look at how we do things. One parent should put their career on hold for a few years to do the more important work of looking after the kids.
I career and identity (whatever that is) is more important then go ahead. Many kids will be fine but some need more attention than others.
A crèche simply doesn’t provide that.
It does provide socialisation however, Tom. Montessori also teaches kiddies pre school curriculum and makes entry into school a lot easier.
Socialisation?
10 kids in a corner?
A child trying to nap when another is crying?
Pre school curriculum?
No need.
They will learn when they go to school, no rush.
They learn nothing granny can’t teach them.
Socialisation is the thing the guilty mother tries to.console themselves with.
You know ‘she’s really happy in there because she gets to meet so many kids”
Tom, have you been to a crèche recently?! 10 kids in a corner?!
As to pre school curriculum, actually it’s really good for kids to learn early. Montessori is a very well established and acknowledged way of teaching.
I wonder why you feel a parent (though I note you said mother) would feel guilty?
I also said above that a child should be looked after by either parent.
I think it’s a no brainer.
A kid is best at home.
At home doesn’t mean they never see another kid but kids need peace too.
Getting dropped at a crèche at 8am to be collected at 5.30pm is not good.
For get the learning.
Where’s the peace, fresh air, walks in the park, feeding the ducks, trip to the shops?
Far more important than the alphabet, believe me.
And granny, Tom, no mention of grandad.
You’re falling into the trap of stereotypical comments; who says every child is dropped off early and picked up late?
There can be plenty of time for walks and picnics and football and baking and playing. My little one is at home with me, I love it, I’m also very lucky and I know it. But he is also and will be an only child. He needed time with other kiddies which wasn’t easily available, spent 3 hours a day ecce year in Creche and adored it. He was looked after by a lovely team of staff for those hours and between time at home and time there, it was a very holistic year.
We need to be realistic here. Children attend Creche, there’s no point in looking for the clock to go back, it won’t.
If the clock won’t go back that’s fine.
I’m just stating the obvious.
As for granny grandad, who cares?
You’re trying to read something that ain’t there.
Not really Tom, you’re harking back to a time of long ago. While I agree things need to change going back to the past isnt necessarily the right way. There are many parents who chose to work outside the home as well as those who must. Neither is wrong.
As to the gender, ah now Tom, you’re a man who chooses his words carefully!!
@Tom Burke: You forgot stories, learning about nature etc but I fully agree with you.
@Tom Burke: voluntarily registered childminders are often stay at home parents who create their own employment, mind their own children and enable parents who choose to or have to work outside the home to do so. We are also above board and tax compliant – yet we are excluded from this scheme.
This is just gas.
“the person that prepares the food for the children, cannot be the same person that changes the nappies.”
Don’t let the wife hear about this…trouble ahead
@Wurps: Stay at home parents should be given full dole but not need to seek work. Anybody who is earning € 200 a week and paying somebody € 200 a week to mind their kids is not fit to be a parent. This is a sham by all accounts and we will be expected to fund conception grants if we don’t start to make people look after their own kids, note I did say they should get full dole for it. It won’t be long before every sharia lover in Europe hears about this.
The Minister for Children who thinks abortion isn’t widely available enough.
U ok?
Romeo you need a nice scented cold towel to wrap around your head?
If you are an unregistered child minder and you fall for this trick…
Katherine exploring ways to bring …… nah, sounds too paly paly to me.
I’m just pointing out that the Minister for Children thinks abortion should be freely available. In the UK where abortion is freely available, 90% of Downs babies are aborted.
Of those not destroyed, over 80% learn to read and write.
What gives Minister Zappone the right to zap life?
“60% of the time it works…Every time.”
Do you scan every story to figure out a way to squeeze the word “abortion” into the comment. Is it like some kind of Catholic tourettes. How do you cope in a restaurant? ” I’ll have a the steak. Medium-well. ABORTION! And a glass of cabernet, please. NOT YOUR UTERUS! And is the desert included in the set menu?”
What are you talking about? I never mentioned the word.
Ooooh kaaaay. [backs away slowly]
This is nonsense.
Bench warrant issued for arrest of Clare Daly over speeding offence. That’s what you get for asking the hard questions!
That’s what you get for disrespecting the court and speeding. Playing the victim card won’t wash
Tis quare when a lesbian is minister for children
@Tom Burke. Of course a child is always best looked after at homecwith a parent. However this is not possible for most families. There are pros and cons to sending your child to a creche. As a childminder who is voluntarily notified with my loxal childcare comittee, a member of Childminding Ireland, registered for tax, First aid trained, Insured , undergone child protection training and Level 5 Fetac Childcatre wualification I try to provide the best of both home environment and creche as do many voluntarily notified childminders like myself. I am a mum myself. I treat the children in my care s if they were my own. I cuddle them if they are upset or sick. I take them for walks, I take them to the park. I paint with them, bake with them. We pkay outside and go on nature walks. I have an abundance of toys and books. They never watch tv in my care. The children are happy and the parents trust me to care for their kids. I see how hard it is for parents to leave their babies while they go to work. I know as I done it with my own son for 3 yrs. Parents should not be shamed or judged for going out to work.
#neveragain will trust independent politician like you her #betrayed
Strange how Ends entrusted care of children to a women who thinks most of them should be aborted. You wouldn’t need a budget for childcare if she had her way.
What about more tax credits for working parents? Single working mother or father receive half what a couple receive.
The fair and useful way to help parents and children is to have extra child benefit, as Fianna Fáil did for a bit, for parents of children under six/ Different families used it in different ways, towards a parent staying at home, towards a relative minding, towards a childminder, towards a creche, towards a playgroup for 3 hours a weekday. I agree that 3 and 4 year olds benefit from playgroups for a few hours of social play a day, but not for anything like the full working day of an adult. Kids who sleep for example 12 hours a night can be spending most of each day in an institution if not minded in a home, their own or someone else’s.
The HSE, as part of a service now run by TUSLA, employed or in some areas funded employment of Childminders’ Advisors who supported childminders in providing quality childcare. They recently dropped this. They need to do this again rather than try to push all childminders, several relatives of the children they mind, into an inspection system with rules that never expect a loving, child-led atmosphere.
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