While caring for both of them in their living room, she moved their beds together to let her father hold her mother’s hand before saying a prayer. “We explained to my dad that Mom only has a week to live,” he said. “He always prayed for us. So it was soothing, but still sad knowing he was saying goodbye to the woman he absolutely loved.” Although Maureen is grateful she was able to take a picture at the time, she also feels that the support she needed to manage her mother’s care at the end of her life was too inconsistent. A survey by the charity Hospice UK found that less than half of the people who died at home during the pandemic received good occupational care, according to loved ones. In addition, it found that 31% of people who died at home did not receive occupational care in the last two weeks of their lives. In Maureen’s case, this lack of physical and practical support led her to have many questions. “I personally would like to know all the details of the death process,” he said. “I put essential oils on my mom, massaged her with my hands and anyone who visited her could massage her and spend some time. “I do not know if my mom was in pain,” he said. “Disappointed, shocked and confused” Maureen also said she did not find out if her mom would need care at the end of her life until she was given a discharge letter from the hospital, despite talking to staff regularly. A situation that he says left her “disappointed, shocked and confused”. As part of Dying Matters Awareness Week, Hospice UK is seeking justice for people like it, renewing its call for home deaths during the pandemic to be addressed by the COVID-19 Public Survey. They also want palliative care in the UK to be more affordable and of better quality. “Throughout the pandemic, thousands of people have been forced to rely on loved ones to care for them, and often struggle to get things like adequate pain relief and great deal of stress and uncertainty,” said charity policy chief Dominic Carter. “While hostels across the UK have begun to successfully adapt services to meet the growing needs of communities, they and other end-of-life care services need more support.” More than εκατο 400 million was given to hostels The government says it is already doing more to support people at the end of their lives, with more than 400 400m given to hostels since the pandemic began, with a spokesman for the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare also pointing to recent law changes. “The Health and Care Act will also improve the delivery of this care by making it clear that Integrated Care Councils are responsible for outsourcing life and palliative care services,” they said. However, for people like Maureen, this is just the beginning, she wants to honor her parents and those who also lost their lives at home during the pandemic, pushing for change, but this week’s ultimate goal is simple. To make people more comfortable talking about death. “My father and I talked about death quite regularly,” he recalled. “We know this is part of the life cycle and I would encourage everyone to have these discussions.”
