Hey everyone,
I have a question of very practical nature. My mother was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer already spread to the bones a year ago. She's still with us, miraculously, but we're never sure for how long.
She's based in Italy but I really want to take her to the UK so me and my family can be her full time carers.
Now I know very well how the health system in Italy works... but I have no clue how the NHS is set up to look after cancer patients.
My mum is understandably quite scared of moving, but she also would like to, in order to be closer to us.
We are based not too far from Manchester so I was thinking of taking her to Christies: does anyone have any first or second hand experience of treatment at Christies? We have a million questions about what it's like to be a cancer patient in the UK. For example how often do you get to speak to a consultant? How often are blood tests done? Do doctors come to your house for those, or do you need to go to the hospital? Is there a 24h help line you can call if you're not well? How easy is it to have a nurse visit your home if you need help? How easy or hard is it to get a wheelchair or other similar forms of help for every day life? What do you do if you have a new symptom? Are they quite keen to hospitalise patients or is care carried out more around the house?
We have loved and hated our experience in Italy. There are lots of consultants here and waiting times are not too long, which in my experience is better than NHS England, but on the other hand the bureaucracy is totally mental, making simple things nearly impossible (we've been trying to get a walking frame for MONTHS and still haven't managed). I would love to hear of your experience, any information or story is useful to help us make a decision and prepare. Thank you to all the kind souls that will reply!
Hi Cicadasing and a very warm welcome to the online community which I hope you'll find is both an informative and supportive place to be.
I'm sorry to read about your mum's diagnosis and I can understand you wanting to move her from Italy to England to live with you.
The online community is divided up into different support groups so I'm going to recommend that you join the lung cancer group so that you can ask your questions about how often lung cancer patients see doctors, etc.
To join just click on the link I've created and then join and post in the same way as you did here. You can also join in with existing conversations by clicking on 'reply'.
As for how to move your mum's care from Italy to England you might find this information from the NHS on moving to England from an EU country helpful.
It would be great if you could pop something about your mum's diagnosis and treatment so far into your profile as it really helps others when replying to you and also when looking for someone on a similar pathway. It also means that you don't have to keep repeating yourself. To do this click on your username and then select 'Profile'. You can amend it at any time and if you're not sure what to write you can take a look at mine by clicking on my username.
If you have any difficulty navigating the community just drop me a reply and I'll be pleased to help
x
"Never regret a day in your life, good days give you happiness, bad days give you experience"
