Urgent Action Required: Continuing Healthcare Deadline Looming

Feb. 27, 2013 - PRLog -- NHS continuing healthcare is a package of continuing care provided outside hospital, arranged and funded solely by the NHS, for people with on-going healthcare needs.

If you are eligible, you can receive NHS continuing healthcare in any setting, for example:

• In your own home: the NHS will pay for healthcare, such as services from a community nurse or specialist therapist, and personal care, such as help with bathing, dressing and laundry

• In a care home: as well as healthcare and personal care, the NHS will pay for your care home fees, including board and accommodation

NHS continuing healthcare is free, unlike social and community care services provided by local authorities for which a charge may be made.

However, over the years thousands of patients have wrongly paid for their own care. If this is you or a family member, even if they have died, you may be able to claim money back.

The Department of Health (DH) announced last year that anyone disputing care fees paid between 1st April 2011 and 21st March 2012 has until the 31st March 2013 to register for an assessment.

Anna Soubry, the Public Health Minister, said: “The deadline to register for an assessment is fast approaching and we want everyone that should have been entitled to be assessed for a past period of care to be considered as soon as possible.”

If you think you have incorrectly paid for full time care in any setting, you have until the end of March to submit a request for an assessment of eligibility. After this deadline, no-one will be able to claim back fees for care provided before 1st April 2012 unless there are exceptional extenuating circumstances.

Please note that if you have had an assessment by the NHS and received a decision, even if you disagree with this, the upcoming deadline does not apply to you.

Cheselden is the UK’s leading NHS Continuing Healthcare advocacy firm, and we can support you with your funding assessment, on-going as well as retrospectively.

Cheselden’s National Clinical Manager, Helen Dyer advises “These new deadlines mean it is essential for anyone who feels their own, or a relative’s care should have been funded by the NHS but has not yet been assessed, to act immediately.”

Contact Cheselden today for a free, no-obligation assessment, or visit the site for more information about how we can help.