Preparing Food: Osteoarthritis and Osteoporosis in Hips

UrbanPigeon

Hello Everybody

I am seeking some advice on an activity on a claim involving PIP. As you may have read in the title it is to do with my hips, i have osteoporosis and osteoarthritis in both hips. When it comes to the activity of preparing food its mainly to do with the hands and preparing food at waste height and not so much to do with standing and hips. I do have pain in my right hand but no diagnosis to link with it. I have spoken to doctors and consultants about the pain in my hand but they have found no reason for it, which i find very odd. My main problem is standing on both hips for any reasonable amount of time to prepare a meal. I have said that i need assistants when preparing food from my carer because without that assistants i would not be able to complete the activity reliably or to an acceptable standard. I have also mentioned that i cannot use a perching stool because of it putting pressure on spinal compression fractures and it causing me significant pain. I seem to be very limited when it comes to having problems with my hips and the activity being mainly about tasks to do with hands more than hips. Wondering whether anyone can offer any advice?

Thank You.

Hannah_Alumni

Hello @UrbanPigeon

How are you today?

I'm sorry to hear that the pain in your hips and hands are effecting you with food preparation. I think what you have put here about how the pain effects you and how the perching stool effects your spinal compression is a great example of what to put on your PIP claim form. 

UrbanPigeon

Hannah_Scope said:

Hello @UrbanPigeon

How are you today?

I'm sorry to hear that the pain in your hips and hands are effecting you with food preparation. I think what you have put here about how the pain effects you and how the perching stool effects your spinal compression is a great example of what to put on your PIP claim form. 

Ok then. Thank You for your reply 

chiarieds

Hi @UrbanPigeon - altho I have osteoarthrosis, my main problem is that I'm in pain the moment I'm upright, & sitting also increases my pain, so I couldn't use a perching stool either. I only got 2 points for this activity of preparing food as I can microwave a meal; I don't know if this would be the same for yourself.

Have you completed your claim form? 

I appreciate that difficulty standing impacts on some activities looked at in the daily living component of PIP. There's more info here e.g: https://pipinfo.net/activities/preparing-food

As you identify, you may not be able to do some activities 'reliably,' but this takes into consideration not only whether you can do an activity to an acceptable standard, but also if it takes you more than twice as long as someone without your problems (also safely, & if you could repeat the activity as often as one would normally expect). Any negative consequences to an activity should also be mentioned such as pain/fatigue. Remember PIP is also how you are the majority of the time.

One should give a couple of recent, detailed examples as to the difficulty you face for each applicable descriptor, i.e. when did it happen, where, what happened, did anyone see this, rather than mention things in general.

UrbanPigeon

chiarieds said:

Hi @UrbanPigeon - altho I have osteoarthrosis, my main problem is that I'm in pain the moment I'm upright, & sitting also increases my pain, so I couldn't use a perching stool either. I only got 2 points for this activity of preparing food as I can microwave a meal; I don't know if this would be the same for yourself.

Have you completed your claim form? 

I appreciate that difficulty standing impacts on some activities looked at in the daily living component of PIP. There's more info here e.g: https://pipinfo.net/activities/preparing-food

As you identify, you may not be able to do some activities 'reliably,' but this takes into consideration not only whether you can do an activity to an acceptable standard, but also if it takes you more than twice as long as someone without your problems (also safely, & if you could repeat the activity as often as one would normally expect). Any negative consequences to an activity should also be mentioned such as pain/fatigue. Remember PIP is also how you are the majority of the time.

One should give a couple of recent, detailed examples as to the difficulty you face for each applicable descriptor, i.e. when did it happen, where, what happened, did anyone see this, rather than mention things in general.

Many thanks for your kind advice. I have been working on my PIP claim with the kind help from my carer who is also my brother and we have covered most of this. Im just a little concerned that the DWP will not take alot of what we have explained into consideration and avoid awarding the points I should have. Anyway, thank you for spending your time to reply

chiarieds

You're welcome, tho it looks like you are well on the way to completing this well. If it's well explained, then the DWP decision maker will take everything into consideration.

The only other good resource I would recommend is the following, tho it's lengthy: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/personal-independence-payment-assessment-guide-for-assessment-providers/pip-assessment-guide-part-2-the-assessment-criteria

Sometimes it's also helpful to keep a brief diary for a week or so as it's easy to forget how much help is often needed as you become used to 'managing' however long it takes, etc. Good luck.

UrbanPigeon

chiarieds said:

You're welcome, tho it looks like you are well on the way to completing this well. If it's well explained, then the DWP decision maker will take everything into consideration.

The only other good resource I would recommend is the following, tho it's lengthy: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/personal-independence-payment-assessment-guide-for-assessment-providers/pip-assessment-guide-part-2-the-assessment-criteria

Sometimes it's also helpful to keep a brief diary for a week or so as it's easy to forget how much help is often needed as you become used to 'managing' however long it takes, etc. Good luck.

Thank you for the link